


Predestination

by AcuteAngleOfTheLord



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV), The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Aromantic Asexual Mick Rory, Child Abuse, Leonard Snart Centric, M/M, Minor Cisco Ramon/Lisa Snart, Queerplatonic Coldwave, Snartric, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-13
Updated: 2017-08-17
Packaged: 2018-12-01 13:53:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 25,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11487732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AcuteAngleOfTheLord/pseuds/AcuteAngleOfTheLord
Summary: His father is still arrested, sentenced to five years, and that sweet, innocent young boy Leo will grow up to be hurt and bruised and sentenced to a life of crime. Sins of the father—No. Len will not let that happen. He will not fail himself, not fail Leo. He has a time machine and he will do everything he can to stop that boy from falling into the dark pit. He will stop that boy from becoming Leonard Snart.--Aka, Len decided to intervene in his own timeline to make himself a better person.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So this was going to be a shortish one shot that kinda just got away from me. I just couldn't get it out of my head that if Len had the chance to change his life he would do it.
> 
> Edited for incorrect ages.

**1975**

The first time he meets himself, it's a shock to his entire system. He wasn't planning on seeing himself, was only going to take the jewel and leave it for his father to find to avoid a prison sentence. It would have given him a clean slate, and maybe he would have had some semblance of a somewhat normal yet slightly dysfunctional family. 

_“I'm Leo.”_

It's like an ice cold punch to the gut. Despite doing the whole time travel thing, despite _going to the house he grew up in_ , Len didn't actually account for running into his past self. The little boy—him, _Leo_ not yet Len—exudes innocence. He's got his whole life ahead of him, and hasn't yet experienced the horrors and abuse and life of crime that awaits him. This little boy doesn't know what it means to be a survivor, doesn't know any of the hard life that Len has been through. 

It breaks Len's heart and Len just wants to steal the boy away to protect him. 

So he crouches down to Leo's height, giving him advice he knows probably won't help to shelter him from the darkness, but maybe to be a reminder, to harden himself against it. Len sometimes thought of this, of what he could say to himself all those years ago, but it's all a lump in his throat when faced with reality, with this sweet and unharmed child. 

It's a moment before his father—before Lewis—pulls a gun on him. The last time he'd be protecting his son from getting hurt and instead would become the one to hurt him. Len hates him, hates leaving his younger self with this monster, this horrible person far more evil than any villain he's encountered. It makes him want to shoot his father (again) but he can't because if there is one good thing that Lewis Snart has ever done in his life, it's creating Lisa. So he leaves the jewel on the table hoping that Lewis won't get arrested, that maybe the worst Leo will ever go know is having an alcoholic for a father without adding abuse to the equation. 

_“Despite your intervention, his future remains unchanged.”_

He feels a surge of anger and hatred wash over him at Gideon's words. His father is still arrested, sentenced to five years, and that sweet, innocent young boy Leo will grow up to be hurt and bruised and sentenced to a life of crime. Sins of the father... 

No. Len will not let that happen. He will not fail himself, not fail Leo. He has a time machine and he will do everything he can to stop that boy from falling into the dark pit. He will stop that boy from becoming Leonard Snart. 

\---  


The Waverider still needs work and repairs, and they are still in 1975 for a few more weeks. Len doesn't let it go. He sees Leo in his dreams, sees Lewis in his nightmares. Relives his horrible memories except instead of Lewis beating him, Len is watching helplessly as his father is striking Leo. 

His nights are restless and his days even more. He needs to do—something. Len is nothing if not stubborn. 

He pilfers money from several people on the streets in the course of a few days, in various locations. It's not that much but it will be something to help the single mother--Len’s mother, his _real_ mother-- whose father is imprisoned. He leaves the envelope of cash in the mailbox, claiming to be a distant relative of Lewis Snart who offered condolences and wanted to help their relative's hurting wife and son. He wishes there was more he could do but they're leaving, off to another time and though he wants to stay, this is something that will take time. 

He leaves 1975 planning, plotting, trying to come up with ways to fix his past. He ends up recruiting Mick and Jax to help. Both look at Len like he's crazy, not wanting to say it outright for different reasons, but they are understanding. Len knows Mick, knows Mick is on his side no matter what. He doesn't even really know Jax, doesn't want to get him involved but he's their designated pilot and though Len will never admit it he's grateful for another person on his team anyway. Until he can learn to fly the ship by himself, Len will have to use Jax to get there. 

Luckily time is on his side.  
\---  
**1979**

He meets himself again at the age of eight. 

The Waverider hiccups and only jumps four years, much to the annoyance of Rip Hunter. Len doesn't claim to understand it or honestly care. It gives him an opportunity. 

He flies out to his neighborhood, finding the exact date. Leo—or perhaps Len now—is out of school, barely just. Len remembers this day well. 

Leo is hidden behind the school, already on the ground. He's curled up protectively and crying, while four other boys from his class are kicking him, taunting him. Len's father is imprisoned, and it's fodder for those in his class to fear him and ostracize him. Leo is learning how to be beaten and abused even before his father turns on him. 

Len will not let that happen to Leo. 

Len steps in and takes out his cold gun, hearing it charge. He ices the asphalt near the boys, not hurting them but threatening.  


“Leave him alone!” Len's eyes are ice-cold in fury, the cold gun now aimed at the group. “You like beating up people? How about you take me on?” 

The four boys scatter away from Leo, but are too afraid to run away. One boy—Mark Greenley, Len remembers—wets himself. 

“Any of you kids touch him again, and I'll turn you all into ice cubes. I'll know if you do. Got it?” Len growls at them, and though he's not going to hurt a bunch of kids—no matter what kind of assholes they are and become—he needs to get it through their thick skulls for when Len's not around. 

The boys are now crying, terrified that this man has a gun on him, and Len feels oddly satisfied to have his grade school bullies reduced to this. 

“Now scram!” He barks, practically a snarl, and the kids take off running. 

He turns to face his younger self, who is looking at Len with wide, scared eyes. Worried about what this scary man will do to him, if he'll shoot him.

Len powers down the gun and tucks it back into his side, dropping his goggles to hang loosely around his neck. He holds out a hand for the boy to take. “I'm not going to shoot you, kid.” 

The boy very carefully takes his hand and Len pulls him up. The fear in his younger self's eyes turn to suspicion as he fully looks at Len's face. “You were at my house before. My dad's friend.” 

Len's expression turns sour at that. It's a trait he's always had, never forgetting a face. Even at an early age, he's always had a very strong photographic memory, one that works well in heists and dealing with undercover badges. But he doesn't want to be associated with his father any more than he has to. “I'm a friend of the family's, not so much your dad.” He pauses. “And I'm your friend too, Leonard.” 

There's a myriad of emotion that flutters across his younger self's face, the beginnings of an expression that Len is now too familiar with. He doesn't have friends, and right now his younger self is beginning to question whether or not he actually needs them. But it seems like a victory when the expression goes away. After all, Len did rescue him. 

“I'm Leo,” he greets him, for the second time in two weeks. It's always a shock to him because Len doesn't remember when he stopped going by Leo, when he stopped using the nickname his father called him. 

“I'm--" Len pauses. He's changing his own timeline, or at least is trying to. That's his ultimate goal. But he doesn't think saying 'I'm you from the future' is actually going to help the kid have a normal life. It's humiliating to even think what his past self would think of Len if he knew he'd end up becoming a washed up criminal. 

_“There's good in you, Snart.”_

Maybe there was at one point. There is certainly good in Leo, the boy who has never known what it's like to hide in fear of his father, the boy who has never begged for food for the first six months out on the streets until he learned to pickpocket. 

He imagines what it would be like if Barry Allen could see him now, if he could meet Leo. He thinks of the young man who influenced him, who reminded him that he could be so much more, if in another lifetime. The man who helped Len take down Lewis on that job so long ago. 

“I'm Sam,” Len says instead, using the fake name Barry had used. He wants to do more for Leo, wants to help him still. He doesn't know when he'll see him next, or what order. For all he knows, Rip could next go to ancient Rome or a hundred years from his current timeline. He wants to do all he can though. 

Leo's eyes travel from Len's face to the Cold gun at his side. It still has residual ice over the barrel. He looks at the patch of ice created to scare those brats away. “You're…a superhero. Like Captain America.” 

“Not quite,” he says, and crouches down to Leo's level, frowning as he thinks over his next words. “Look, Leo. Kid. I'm gonna try and protect you as much as I can though. See, I don't really think I'm the superhero type, but you know what, I don't like bullies either.” 

Leo's expression was so open that it nearly hurts Len to remember himself in a time where he could afford to wear his heart on his sleeve. The kid looks so awestruck by him. “That's what Captain America says too.” 

That tugs on Len's heartstrings and emotions threaten to rise to the surface as he remembers himself at that age. He remembers just how obsessed he'd been with comics as a child. Of someone big and strong enough to stand up to the bad guys. How he'd wished someone could stand up for him and protect him from all the monsters in his life. And Len—he isn't a superhero, he is a supervillain, if anything—but he can't bring himself to kill any hope this child has. 

“Maybe--" Len takes a breath. “Think of me as your own personal superhero then. You can call me Captain Cold.” 

“Cool,” Leo says excitedly, and Len can't help the way his lips tug up in a small smile—look at him teaching his eight year old self to make Cold puns. Leo's face turns hopeful. “Are you gonna fight those guys for me, Captain Cold? They've been picking on me every day 'cause of my dad.” 

He needs to get back to the ship soon. He shakes his head. “Look, Leo--you gotta fight back. I'm gonna try to be here as much as I can but I need you to fight back, as best as you can on your own. A bully will only keep picking on you until you stand up to them, make yourself heard. Your dad went to prison, but that doesn't mean it's your fault, okay? I want you to always remember that.” 

It's going to be a year until Leo's father comes out of prison. Six months after he's out is when he starts hitting Leo's mother and soon after begins beating a nine year old Leo. “Fight back, no matter who it is hurting you, you fight back. You tell everyone you can about what's going on, and you fight back.” Two things Len wished he could have done back then. 

_“Snart, man, we gotta go, Hunter's calling an all hands on deck emergency—“_

Jax's voice is in his ear through the comm, breaking Len out of his thoughts. “I'll be right there,” he replies to the engineer. He needs just one more minute. 

Leo's eyes are wide, watching him. Len is grateful Leo hasn’t tried running away, though Len hates that he to leave. It’s obvious that at this stage Leo is wanting to trust someone, to have someone help him.

“I'll come visit you again,” he says, and he is nothing if not a man of his word. “I promise. I'm gonna do my best to protect you, your mom, and your sister.” 

Leo's eyes narrow and he frowns, and just as Leo opens his mouth to speak, Len's comms begin to go off and it’s Palmer and Stein telling him to hurry up, before the world explodes or something—

Len gives Leo a small smile, before he turns around and goes back into the shuttle. He's not one for goodbyes. 

Later when he's back onboard the time ship, Gideon informs him that once again, his timeline was not altered. While Len still wishes the timeline was different that he had saved himself, he doesn't feel like he failed, not this time. 

Today in Len's past, he had prayed and hoped for someone to save him. The boys had left him battered and bruised and taunted him, saying horrible things about him and his family. No one had come to his aid, and after twenty minutes the boys had left Len beaten and crying on the gravel with the realization that no one would save him, that he is alone and would always be. Today was the day in his life that he had stopped trusting, where he began to harden his heart. 

Today in Leo's past, however, Len changed that. 

\--- 

**1989**

Len is too late, too late to save Leo from the hands of his father and that hurts. But he still has to try.  
Len had run out of his father's home at the age of seventeen. He would have done it earlier but he needed to be there to protect Lisa. He'd been naïve, thinking he could save Lisa through the legal system. But adopting a nine year old at his age with a record and claiming his corrupted cop of a father was an unfit parent and that Len's scars weren't 'accidents from rough housing' with no evidence or judges on his side is laughable. And that's exactly what had happened, he'd been laughed right out of the courtroom. The judge was right in Lewis' pocket, despite Lewis' prior. In theory Lewis should be mistrusted now—and yet somehow he'd gotten his job back with the CCPD, albeit a much lower position. 

_And his mom..._

Leo is seventeen, almost eighteen and it hurts Len's heart to know that all of that has still taken place, most likely. But he still wants to help in any way he can. 

Despite his brief stay in juvie at fourteen, Len didn't really pick up his life of crime until he was nineteen, after he lost the case and Lewis managed to freeze whatever accounts he had and Len had nothing, nothing but debt and background experience in helping on heists and it wasn't long before desperate times called for desperate measures. 

Len doesn't know where in the timeline he's at, whether this was before he lost his life or whether there's still a chance. He reaches the apartment complex where he'd lived up until he went broke and moved in with Mick, hoping Leo was still there. 

He sneaks inside the apartment complex with another tenant, then heads to Leo’s dingy one-bedroom apartment. He knocks on the door, his chest tight with hope and fear.

Leo answers the door, and it hits Len how similar they already look. The reality and gravity of the situation hits Len at once.

And, incidentally, so does Leo’s fist.

Len gets taken aback by the punch to the face, gently touching his mouth to check to see if there’s blood. He looks at his younger self with a feeling of confusion and shock.

The first thing that flashes through Len’s mind is how surprised he is that Leo recognizes him after ten years. He underestimates himself sometimes.

Leo glares at Len, looking at him with anger and coldness. “Whatever you have to say, Sam, you better make it good.”

Len knows his tells, knows himself to realize that Leo is not only afraid of him, but is also angry at Len and at himself for what’s happened. For Len not being able to protect Leo and Lisa and their mother.

It breaks Len’s heart to know the pain Leo’s gone through, to be able to see it in himself at a younger age. He thinks of the little boy he met only a few months ago ( _years_ , he has to remind himself) and it strikes Len at how young the man in front of him still is. There is still hope, maybe.

“I’m sorry.” It’s the first thing that comes from Len’s mouth. It’s not often he apologizes, and it’s even rarer that he means it. “I promised I would protect you, but--”

He can’t finish, can’t say some lame excuse and can’t tell him the truth. He squares his shoulders and looks at his younger self. “I’ve been away for too long, and I’m sorry. But even if I couldn’t protect you, I still can try.”

He pulls out a stack of cash from his various trips through time, pilfered here and there. He sees Leo’s eyes zero in on it, debating on whether to accept the charity or to stick to his pride. In the end he takes it from Len’s hand, jaw tight, and lets him in.

Len steps into the little apartment and there is a wave of nostalgia that hits him at once.

He swallows it down, steps awkwardly into the living room and sits down on the couch. Leo isn’t going to hit him or try anything. The truth is, he’s broke and barely able to survive. He is ready to take anything, legal or not.

It hits Len hard that Leo talking to him is a testament to how lonely the boy is.

“Captain Cold,” Leo’s voice snaps Len out of his trip down memory lane. He looks up as his younger self continues, arms crossed over his too-skinny chest. The condescending tone is not quite yet a drawl. “Superhero, and family friend. Bullshit. You look very similar to me, you know where I live and things about me. I know who you really are.”

Len stops, looks up at his younger self. Frowns in confusion because honestly, he didn’t think he was that smart.

“And that is--?”

“A relative,” says Leo, arms still crossed over his chest. “We’re related. I’m guessing through my dad considering the gun and your ability to get my addresses and information. And probably why--I feel like I know you.”

There’s a part of Len that relaxes, but a part of him that wishes he could tell him the truth. He debates on whether that would change things, or whether it would cement them.

“Close.” Len says instead. He’d planned out a whole conversation before, but as always--the plan is thrown out the window. The irony that not even Leonard Snart can stick to his own plan is not lost on him. Still, he doesn’t want to exactly lie to himself, so instead he just twists the truth. “I’m related through your mother. Your--your biological mother. We’re not exactly close but--when I found out about you, I wanted to try to help. Set things right. I’m not happy with the way she left. I’m not happy about a lot of things you’ve been through.”

“And why the hell would you wanna do that? She never wanted to stick around or be there for me.” Leo’s face was more of a snarl.

“Because--” Len took a deep breath, and admitted something he never vocalized in all of his forty-two years. “Because my mother abandoned me when I was little, and my father abused me too.”

There is a sigh that comes from Leo, like he’s been punched in the gut. The younger sits down across from Len, rubbing a hand over his face. Len knows he hadn’t been expecting to hear that.

The younger man takes time to process, and when he looks up at Len, his eyes are softer, his stance less threatened and afraid. Len knows the feelings Leo is having, the deep down desire of wanting to connect to someone, of not being alone anymore. “You know, I didn’t think you were real. For a long time, I thought I had made you up. That you were some--imaginary friend or that I went crazy. I used to beg for you to save me from--”

Len swallows, flinching. His mind flashes to a memory, faint and dreamlike, of the little boy Leo crying in his room, wishing for Captain Cold to save him from his father. It’s an awful memory and Len feels his own chest tighten.

He knows that Leo says this to make Len feel guilty, to hurt him. And it works. But Len doesn’t leave, doesn’t give up.

“Listen, kid. Leo--”

“Lenny.”

Len stops, pausing. That was--new, actually. Len didn’t remember ever preferring to be called Lenny, except by his sister. Maybe it was a way of Leo--Lenny--feeling close to her even when she was so far away.

He tries again. “Listen, Lenny. I don’t like spilling my guts to people, so I’m only going to say this once. My father was a bad man. I hated him. But more than that, when I was your age, he ended up putting me through hell and I had to do what I had to do to survive, including illegal things. And as time went on and I became more angry and more bitter and in and out of jail, you know what I realized? I’d become just like him. A petty thief, and a bad guy.”

Lenny raises an eyebrow, then rolls his eyes. “Yeah. I’ve been in jail already. Think you’re a little late for that one, Gray-Hair.”

Len sighs a little. He was such a brat when he was younger. “I know about your record, which is exactly why I want to have this little chat with you. So you don’t turn out like me.”

Lenny snorts. “So what, I’m your little project? Your life was shit and now you’re going to tell me that I need to respect cops and the law and live a white-picket-fence life?”

“Fuck cops,” Len says, because hey, it’s true. Cops have never been good to Len, starting with his own dad. There’s a cold anger in his eyes, his own self hatred. “You wanna know what I became? I became a villain. Sure it started with me pickpocketing people on the streets and whoring myself out for money, but then that wasn’t good enough. Not fun enough. I started robbing, started killing. Started my own gang, and putting anyone down who got in my way. I put a bullet in my dad just a few years ago. And you know what I realized through all of that? All the pain and suffering I caused to people, to families. I had become him. And I don’t want you to become Lewis.”

There’s a quiet stillness in the room, Lenny swallowing. Len had never admitted that either. It took Barry Allen to show him that, to show him what Len had become and that he could have been--more. He changed Len, but it was too late for him now. Bodies and pain were something he couldn’t take back.

Lenny looks away, toward the windows that show a bleak and dreary day. “What am I supposed to do? People won’t hire someone with a record. Not to mention someone with a record and no high school degree.”

Len is not a historian, but he remembers enough about the late eighties to know that the job market has had one of the biggest booms this year. Still, he knows himself enough to know the thoughts probably swirling through the other’s head.

“You have plenty of skills, Lenny, and you can develop them. You could get your GED, go to college if you want. Or you can work anywhere, do anything. You’re smart, you’re resourceful, and you have experience working with your hands. Until then--I’ll give you money when I can, on the condition that you keep your head up and out of trouble. That’s my only condition. There’s five thousand dollars so far, which should get you by for a little while.”

Lenny is quiet, tugging at his long sleeved shirt in a habit that Len still has when he feels vulnerable.

“Are you happy you killed him?” Lenny asks after a long time, a question that surprises Len once again. “Your father.”

Len thinks a long moment. “I’m happy he can never hurt me or my sister again. But honestly--I’m more--sad that he never felt sorry for the things he did. And that in the end, I let him win.”

Lenny is quiet again, contemplative. Finally he looks up at Len, then nods. “If I knew I could adopt my sister, that she wouldn’t be thrown into the system, I’d--” He stops. Then he pauses. “But then--I remember when I was a kid, and he’d take me along on jobs with him. He was always so proud of me if I did things right. I remember him when I was little, when it was him and my mom and me, and things weren’t perfect but he was--my dad.”

Len remembers those memories. It had taken him years to stop thinking he could change his dad, that he could make Lewis love him and proud of him. He remembers when he was two and Lewis would put Len up on his shoulders, or when Lewis would take him riding around in the police car, or when his mother would make them waffles. It was memories like that that kept Len from seeing the ugly truth for so long. That lessons were not lessons, but rather abuse from a terrible father and awful man, changed beyond repair.

“See what you can do to make visits with Lisa happen. Keep her in your life.” Len says. “She only has a few more years with him, and then the future is yours.”

He stands up, putting his parka back on. “I’ll come visit you again, kid. Hopefully not ten years later this time.”

There’s a frown that croses Lenny’s face for a moment before he shakes his head. “Thanks for--for the cash, Sam.”

Len nods, looking at his younger self. He hopes that maybe this will change him, change himself.

He leaves and goes back to the Waverider. But he’s the same as ever, same bitter man with a rap sheet and a body count.

Nothing changes in his timeline.

\--

**???**

Len, however, is changing, and he doesn’t know if he’s okay with this kind of change.

It starts with 2046 with Mick finding his own little Disneyland. Not that Len is surprised--after all, Len would have found it more appealing if it weren’t for the threat of Savage, his own personal mission to try to change his timeline and the fact that, had they stayed in this alternate future they’d be wiped from existence if it happened to change. But honestly? He isn’t sure if those are the true motivations at all or because maybe that kind of future starts to look boring to him. Static, and with no kind of reward. He wants to be a part of the team, to help his--he wouldn’t call them friends but they aren’t enemies and they’re more than just crew. He wants to help and to do the right thing, which is stopping Savage from destroying the universe he loves.

It seems that he has grown, while Mick has stayed the same.

That doesn’t really bother Len until he realizes that Mick’s reaction is more than just a temper tantrum. He turns on the team, shacks up with time pirates.

It’s hard without him, without his partner in crime. He has known Mick for so long, has been inseparable. There were only a handful of times when he and Mick weren’t glued at the hip, and that was when Len was trying to be an upstanding citizen to try to win the case to adopt Lisa at seventeen, when Mick had burned down his house with his parents inside of it and went to jail.

And now.

Mick is Len’s brother, his defender. Len is Mick’s impulse control and his conscience. Mick is Len’s backbone, his confidence, his anger. Mick is the person that made Len able to encase his heart with ice and stand up for himself, to protect himself from people like Lewis and to fight back.

Len is antsy without Mick around. He hates himself for leaving his partner stranded in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of time. He feels guilty for not being able to see the extent of Mick’s anger and hurt that stemmed from the way the team distrusted him, from the way Len distrusted him. He feels guilty, most of all, that he sided with his team over his partner of almost thirty years.

He knows he’s different, that he’s got some kind of sense of morality and something--something that Barry Allen would be proud of, honestly. Len had had a code before, but now...it’s not just a code. It’s this feeling of stopping a horrible villain from damaging the timeline, of stopping people who used to be similar to him, even at the cost of his closest friend.

He wonders if maybe it’s that morality that had stopped him from icing Jax when the younger had been turned into a rabid creature by Savage. If it wasn’t just some code of a crew but because in his heart he knew he didn’t want to be a killer anymore, like he had been before. Not when he could prevent it.

_There’s good in you, Snart…_

He hears similar messages from Stein and Jax after they restore Jax back to his usual self. He’s not a hero, never was a hero. A hero is like Barry, pure and good and never knowing what it’s like to have to kill for money, to kill for the sake of killing. He has too much blood on his hands to be a hero, including his partner now.

Mick isn’t dead, he knows this, but in a way--he’s not coming back.

Len is changing, but this isn’t the kind of change he had wanted.

\--

Len is sick to his stomach.

Maybe he hasn’t changed at all. Maybe he’s still the same fucked up person he always was. Maybe he still is Lewis Snart’s son after all.

Mick is Chronos. The Time Masters found Mick after Len had abandoned him and tortured him, warped his mind. Hurt his team, hurt him.

Len is the one who is responsible for everything that had happened to his partner.

It’s hard for Len to think about. It makes him sick to his stomach. The night he learns about Chronos, the night after Mick threatens his baby sister (who Mick loves as much as Len does), the night where Len loses his own hand to save his team but especially _Mick_ \--

That night Len closes and locks the door to his quarters, sinks on the floor and hugs his knees to his chest and cries for the first time in years.

He’s still the same scared little boy that wishes he could be rescued, even if it’s from himself.

\--

**2017**

Len is trying to contemplate his next plan for his timeline when he runs into Barry Allen. Or rather, Barry Allen runs to him.

Barry Allen is pure, good, the real hero. He’s the type of person that shouldn’t be so appealing to Len, but he is. Len wants to be with him, to corrupt him, to have Barry fix Len and put the pieces back together.

Barry wants Len to help save his step sister Iris from being murdered. Len won’t lie, despite the bravado and the truth in the appeal of breaking in ARGUS, Len hears Mick’s voice threatening to kill Lisa over and over again in his mind. There’s something raw in Barry’s voice that Len can relate to, the need to do anything and everything to protect family.

They work together, and it’s a rush of adrenaline. It’s almost like working with Mick but--it’s also feeding into this new moral rush he gets on the team.

Barry is darker now, and Len doesn’t know how to feel about it. He admires it when Barry is kicking ass (something he will probably replay on repeat in his mind on lonely nights) but what worries him is the ruthlessness Barry seems to have toward hurting others.

He remembers the kid who had come into his bar, asking Len not to kill anymore innocents. Len sees the irony that the present-Barry doesn’t seem to mind collateral damage.

Still. Barry risks his sister’s life to save Len. There is honor in that, and Len can’t help but feel a little pleased.

After the mission is over, Barry doesn’t drop Len off right away. He seems to see something in Len, and instead he asks Len for a drink.

Ironically they go to Saints ‘n’ Sinners.

“Spit it out, Barry. I may be a time traveler, but I haven’t got all day,” Len says as he watches Barry thinking about what to say.

Finally, Barry sighs. “I don’t know. You just--you seem different. I was wondering how things are--how they’re going.”

It sounds weak, even to Len. There’s something Barry isn’t telling him, something no one has been telling him like Len has been some kind of elephant in the room. Honestly, there is a part of Len that doesn’t want to know. Barry is from a near future, after all, and Len knows better than to ask those kind of questions.

“I could say the same about you,” Len says instead. “You seem--darker. I like it.”

Barry looks down at his drink that’s barely been touched. He’s playing with the condensation on the bottle and Len’s eyes zero in on the nimble fingers for a moment.

“Tell me, Snart, did you think I had it in me? To leave you behind?” Barry’s eyes look up at him, and they’re almost vulnerable.

“I wasn’t sure,” he replies, and he has to look down at his own drink. At his newly regenerated hand. He wonders if Mick had thought Len had it in him to leave his oldest friend and partner behind. “I’ve always known you’ve had the potential to be as ruthless as they come. Your history made sure of that, same as mine. Who knows, maybe that’s why we get along. You see the good in me. I see the bad. A little word of advice. Stop trying to beat you-know-who at his own game. Your goodness is your strength.”

Barry is quiet at that, not sure whether to take it as a compliment. He pauses, rolling his bottle on the bottom, watching it spin in a slow circle between his hands.

“What do you think made us so different? If our history is so similar...what made you so…” he looks helpless, trying to think of a tactful word.

“Cold?” Len finishes for him, smirking a little at the pun. “Who knows. Maybe you’re inherently good and I’m inherently bad. Or there was a point in my timeline where I became a cold-blooded killer. I’d say we’d never know but--I do have the means to find out now.”

Barry’s head jerks up at that, meeting Len’s gaze. “Leonard, you can’t go and try to change your past--”

“If you’re going to use my first name, call me Len,” he interrupts and makes a face. “And believe me, I’ve tried, but--time has a funny way of never changing.” There is a part of him wondering why he’s telling his somewhat nemesis about this, but Barry is probably the one person who gets why, and has experience in time travel.

Barry frowns at that. “What are you talking about?”

Len pauses for a moment. Then he decides to go all in. Barry might be able to help, and Len has been needing some kind of guidance now that Mick isn’t there for him.

“I’ve met myself three times,” he says. “Every time we land somewhere in my lifetime I make a little trip to see--me. I’ve tried to do some interventions, but my timeline never changes. I’m still the same old me with the same shitty life.”

Barry pauses, and the frown deepens. “That’s--that’s not how that should work.” He shakes his head. “Do you have memories of meeting yourself?”

Len frowns because he didn’t even know that was a thing except--when Stein encountered his younger self, the scientist slowly acquired memories of that day. He should have some kind of memory of meeting himself. “No.” He says finally and frowns. “Probably one of the perks of being a constant time traveller.”

Barry is quiet because even though he has some kind of experience with time travel, it’s through the Speed Force and his powers and not through a time ship. Maybe Len is doing this the right way.

Barry finally looks up at him, with so much emotion in his eyes that Len could drown in them.

“I tried to change my past,” he says softly. “I went back in time the night my mother died, and I saved her. I stopped it from happening. My life--it was great for the most part. I didn’t become a meta. I had both my mother and father alive and happy and--things were good. But when I changed things--it affected other people in ways I couldn’t even imagine.”

Len hears his story about Flashpoint. It’s a little weird to know that Barry’s intervention in his own personal life affected the careers of the rest of Team Flash until Barry tells him about Harrison Wells and Eobard Thawne and the Reverse Flash.

And finally, it ends with Barry watching his brother get hurt, almost die from Barry’s own actions.

“Maybe if you change things, it won’t be like that,” Barry says after. “You’re messing with time but the Speed Force doesn’t control you. It doesn’t care. Maybe you’re doing things the right way. But over time--you start to forget your old life. The new timeline replaces it. If you succeed--you might erase yourself as you are now.”

Len’s gaze flickers down. “Maybe I’m betting on it.”

He feels a warm hand cover his, and he looks up. Barry’s beautiful hazel eyes are staring at him, with that intense emotion again.

“Len.” It’s soft and sad and Len is not ready to hear any of this. “You don’t need to change your history. You’re different. You’re good, and a hero.”

Len squares his jaw, his shoulders tight and he jerks his hand away from Barry. He immediately misses the warmth, and the irony isn’t lost on him. “I don’t need a lecture from you, Barry. And certainly not a do-gooder speech from a man who wanted to kill just hours ago.”

There’s a bit of an uncomfortable silence that follows, when Barry is squirming with a little bit of guilt. Honestly, Len wouldn’t hesitate to kill whatever and whoever to protect his sister. He already killed his father to save her, and he’d do it again. He isn’t sure if he blames Barry for his anger.

“Maybe if I do end up changing, things could be different,” Len finally says. “Maybe--I could be the man you think I am.”

Barry looks at him, still saying nothing. But this time it’s more contemplative.

Len pauses, then he looks down at his beer label. “Maybe--maybe things could be different...with me and you.”

He finally looks up at Barry. Baring a fraction of his heart past all the layers of ice.

Barry looks like a wounded puppy, and he opens his mouth to speak but closes it. There’s a look in Barry’s face like he wants to confess something, bad or good. Len has a feeling it’s not about whatever is between them, but of whatever they’d been hiding from Len all day.

“I’ll miss you,” Barry says softly. “I--I know that you are the man I know you are. A good man. And maybe if you do this--maybe you’ll be a happy and good man. I couldn’t save my parents. But I know how much it is to want to change things. Maybe--you can do what I never could. And when you do--maybe we can find each other. Although I’ll miss working with you.”

Len frowns a little. He’s surprised that Barry is encouraging it. There’s something that will happen to Len, he’s sure of it now. The way everyone was walking on eggshells, the way Barry has been talking to him like he’d been wishing he could.

Len feels it settle uneasily in his gut, and he doesn’t want to ask questions.

Finally he puts his drink down. “I think I’m ready to go back. We got our own battles to fight.”

Barry nods, then zips them out and back to 1892 like Len never left.

There’s a pause before the scarlet speedster goes to him and gives Len a kiss on the lips, and Len feels like he’s been electrocuted in the best way possible.

It’s quick and chaste and over too soon and Barry pulls back. “Goodbye, Len. Take care of yourself.” He says, and it’s sad and final and he doesn’t like it.

“No strings on me,” Len says, and he knows he means he’s a free man and looks after himself but--there’s something he can’t place right there.

He watches Barry leave, and his lips are still tingling. But more so, like anything with Barry, Len feels empowered, strong. Like he can do anything.

So he decides to go back to his mission, and he plans.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A little more Coldflash in here. Also a lot of Snartblings interactions because Lisa and Len are just really super adorable.
> 
> So this episode takes place right after The Last Refuge in LoT, and also directly after Invasion! and before Barry sees Savitar killing Iris in the future (so he's a lot happier, understandably, and on less of a time constraint).
> 
> Thank you to all you wonderful people who have left kudos and commented. I can't begin to tell you how much it means to me.

**???? **

The Pilgrim is a distraction, but also an opportunity. 

The opportunity of course is because Len has the opportunity to kill two birds with one stone, so to speak. His baby self is already on the ship, gorgeous as ever and being looked after by the team. 

It would be so easy to steal himself away, to drop him off at the doorstep of someone good. Someone who would raise him the way he should have been. 

With himself out of the way, he reasons, it’s easier to fix the dysfunctional family. Lewis Snart wouldn’t have to know him. Wouldn’t have to be reminded of the wife that abandoned Lewis, wouldn’t have a screw up of a kid. 

But then Lisa gets kidnapped by the Pilgrim and the idea of Len not returning his baby self gets put on hold for just a moment while he kicks the Pilgrim’s ass to get his sister back. 

When everything's said and done, Len has his sister safe and sound, but confused as to what’s going on. 

They explain what’s happening to their loved ones as best as they can. Quentin, Clarissa and Lisa are among the ones who understand the best--after all, they already know about metahumans and have lived through the chaos of supervillians and superheroes. Quentin takes to it immediately, knowing his daughter since she was already in his life, Clarissa is more accepting of the aspect of time travel than having a husband that she doesn’t remember, and Lisa thinks the idea of time travel seems cool but doesn’t understand why she was dragged into it. Len can’t stomach telling her who he is in front of everyone, instead leaving her be for the moment. He thinks he sees her looking at him curiously, but that could just be wishful thinking. 

But then there is a curiosity that gets a hold of him, and the truth is he misses Lisa dearly. 

He walks to the room where she’s staying, knocking on the door. His baby sister looks up at him curiously--blankly. 

“Just wanted to check up on you, see how you’re feeling,” he says, watching her from the doorway. “Before long you’ll be back at home watching Star Wars in no time.” 

She frowns at him, and there’s something in her eyes that Len doesn’t like. Her next words are like a punch to the gut. 

“Sorry--who are you again?” 

Rip had explained it to Len just a few minutes before. When they kidnapped their baby selves, they hadn’t quite existed. Lisa wouldn’t remember Len because Len was never in her life. 

Len wants to lie. He wants to tell Lisa he’s no one, or that he’s someone great. But he’s curious, wanting to know if this is it, if this is where he needs to stop. If he’s the variable that needs to go. 

He sits down on the bed, putting space between them. “My name is Leonard. Leonard Snart. I’m--I’m your brother. Older, by about five years.” 

Lisa shakes her head. Not understanding. “No, that’s--” she wraps the blanket around her more tightly, as if to protect herself from this revelation. “My brother died when he was a baby.” 

Len swallows. Of course he’s presumed dead, or missing. He was taken as a baby, and they never found him. He hadn’t thought about that really. Lisa would have grown up without a brother, but it wasn’t as if he had never existed. He was just a memory, a story. 

Len looks down. “Everything that you saw--all of this. There’s--” He sighs. “Time travel is real. And it’s something that I do. I grew up with you, Lisa. But on this job--something happened. Someone came after us, was going to kill me at a point in time and erase me from existence. We didn’t know when. And the only way we could stop it was to kidnap myself as a newborn baby.” 

He takes out a photo, one that he’s carried since his younger years. It’s a happy photo, with him, Lisa and Lisa’s mom. A happy family. 

Lisa takes it gingerly, as if afraid it will fall apart. Afraid that it isn’t real. She falls silent for a few minutes, letting it sink in. Len wants to hug her, to console her. But he knows Lisa well enough to know that she’ll clam up, that she’ll snap at this stranger. 

He hates doing this to his sister. But he wants to know. He wants to see how happy she is without him, without the screw up a brother who made their father hate, who made him desperate enough to steal to provide for him and his son. Who made Lewis go to jail and come back as an abuser. The brother who vowed to save Lisa from a life of fear and instead make her fall into a life of crime. 

Maybe she’s a lawyer like she had always wanted to be. Maybe she’s rich, happy. Maybe she has a good and honest life, one without pain. One without him-- 

“So it was you.” 

The quiet yet firm voice startles Len out of his thoughts. Lisa is still looking down at the picture, just for a moment. But when she looks up--he sees the hurt and anger in her eyes. 

“This was your fault. You--you did all of this.” Lisa is angry, and no. No, this isn’t right. 

“Lisa--” 

“No!” She doesn’t yell but her voice is raised. “You put me through--through hell. You know right after you were--after they thought you were dead, your mom left? She left Dad and--it changed him. And he met my mom years later and--she had no idea what he was. She didn’t know until after I was born. He was a drunk, and he was violent. If it wasn’t Mama he was hitting he would turn on me and--” 

She thrusts out her arm to him, pushing up the sleeve. Len recognizes some of the scars. He has identical ones on his own arm. He feels sick. 

“He murdered my mother, Leonard. Right in front of me. And I--” she pulls her sleeve back down. “He said I was your replacement. That I wasn’t good enough as a daughter because he wanted a son to teach to be his partner in crime. That all I was good for was to sell to make him more money.” 

Len is shaking. His eyes are wide, and he feels worse than he ever did. 

“It all happened because he lost his first kid,” Lisa says. “He would say it over and over again. That maybe Leonard wouldn’t have been a fuck up like me, that if Leonard had lived he’d be nice, but instead he had to deal with me.” 

Len feels a rush of guilt and looks down. Lisa is--different. Broken. He doesn’t realize just how many times he had intervened when they were kids. He’d tried as much as he could but seeing her scars, seeing her breaking like this is almost too much. 

The worst part, is that none of it was different. Len’s birth mother still had left when he was a baby. Lewis met Lisa’s mom and the three of them bonded, Len had known her as his own mother, up until-- __

_He comes down the stairs and the smell of bleach hits his nostrils. It’s pungent and there is something else that lingers in the air. Something sinister._

_Lewis is scrubbing a stain out of the floor._

_“Dad?” Eleven year old Leo rubs his eyes sleepily. Mama usually wakes them up early for breakfast before school but now the table is empty._

_“Go get ready for school, Leo,” Lewis’ voice is cold, hard._

_“Where’s Mama?” the boy asks, wanting to know. The smell of bleach is almost too much._

_Lewis stops scrubbing and looks up at Leo with equally cold eyes. “She left us, Leo. Left us, just like your real mother. Said she didn’t want to deal with you or Lisa anymore. She learned her lessons, but she knew you two never will.”_

_Leo feels the hurt curl hot in his belly. He’s scared that Lewis is right. His father’s words cut deep, the insecurity from his birth mother’s absence rising to the surface. He knows deep down though, that their Mama would never leave. She tried to get them out and away from Lewis’ brutal hands, the broken beer bottles._

_She got them far away just a couple nights ago, to a hotel. Lewis found them, and after they talked for a while, their Mama agreed to come back home. Leo had thought that maybe Lewis was apologizing, that he had seen the light and was promising never to hurt them again._

_He hadn’t seen Mama since._

Len had always been in denial. He always had hoped that his Mama had really up and left, that maybe she was alive and well somewhere and happy without living in fear of Lewis. He couldn’t stomach the real alternative. 

There’s something in Len’s demeanor that seems to take the anger and fight out of Lisa, her eyes wide and sad as they meet Len’s. Len knows that look, that scared little girl who hid away from their father while Len took the beatings for her. 

“When you put him--you back...will it make us happy?” she asks him, and Len doesn’t know how to answer. 

Instead he pushes his own sleeves up, showing her the scars he wears. The ones he will gladly wear if it means she didn’t have to. “Things won’t be perfect. Dad’s a shitty person regardless of the timeline it seems. But I protected you as much as I could. I will protect you. And we’re close.” He swallows as her eyes are focused on the scars. Recognizing some of them from her own different yet similar childhood. “No matter what or who we lose, we will always have each other.” 

Finally her eyes meet his. 

“Lisa,” he says, voice soft. A confession she won’t remember or even understand if she does until it is too late. “Everything I do, all of this. I do for you. For us. To give us a better life.” 

He pauses and gently takes her hand. “Our next jump is 1972. We’re going to return the baby selves before we permanently erase ourselves from existence. It shouldn’t be long but your memories should come back. You know where to find me when they do.” 

He stands up, but is surprised by the small grip on his wrist, firm and scared. 

“Please,” she said, and it was soft. “Stay? Tell me about--about you? About us.” 

Len will never deny his baby sister anything, so he does. 

\-- 

Lisa remembers Len shortly after they drop his baby self off back at the hospital as if it had never happened. 

She throws her arms around him and hugs him. She doesn’t remember the other life time, and when Len ‘accidentally’ pushes up her sleeves, her arms are bare. The only scar she has is the one on her collarbone. The only time Len couldn’t stop her from getting hurt. 

He hugs Lisa to him, glad to see her, glad that she remembers him and even happier that she will never grow up alone. 

\--- 

**December 2016**

After Len drops off Lisa, the team gets a day in 2016 to recover. It’s a date almost a year ahead from when Rip had recruited them, and so they get the time off to visit their families and loved ones. 

Lisa is more than happy to see Mick, and she hugs him tight while he spins her in the air. It occurs to Len that it’s the first time Mick has seen Lisa in possibly decades since his time with the Time Masters. The three of them were once like family, and in a way they still are. 

Lisa invites them to go out and ‘have fun,’ which Len isn’t entirely sure if she means something normal like watching a movie or something illegal like blowing something up. He isn’t sure he’s up for it either way, despite wanting to stay with them. 

He’s too fixated on his project, on figuring out the best point in time to change things. Should he change himself slowly like he’s been trying, or is there a definite point in his life that could stop everything? 

He’s promises to meet up with Mick and Lisa later for drinks, just like old times, but first he has to do something else. 

He finds Barry at Jitters, amused that the Flash has a metahumanly fast metabolism and yet still drinks coffee habitually. 

Barry is ordering at the register, digging through his layers of coats and pockets for payment. He looks like he’s about to say something like he left his wallet in his superhero costume when Len comes to the rescue. 

“This one’s on me,” he says, watching Barry sputter. Len gives the cashier a twenty, giving Barry what he knows is a lewd expression. “And I’d like to have the Flash.” 

Barry’s cheeks don’t go red like Len expects. Instead the younger is looking at Len as if he’s a ghost. 

Interesting. 

When Len goes to the pick up counter to get their drinks, Barry follows him. He feels Barry’s grip on his arm, getting Len to face him. 

“How the hell did you get here, Snart?” the younger demands, and while Len likes to see Barry riled up, this time it’s different. It’s raw. 

“Hello to you too, Barry,” Len sing-songs back at him, smirk ever present on his lips. “Apparently I’m coming to your rescue. Leave your wallet in your comfy spandex?” 

Barry makes a sound that’s like a wounded puppy, and Len is a sucker. “I mean--” his voice is soft, sad. “I thought you were...dead.” 

And there it is. Len figured as much, but hearing it--it’s something else. 

The worst part is, Lisa must not have known. He wonders if anyone bothered to tell her. 

He grabs his coffee, handing Barry his, then ushers the younger man outside where they can talk without being overheard. Finally, he takes a long sip, savoring the flavor. 

“I haven’t had good coffee in months,” Len muses. “Gideon likes everything sugar free.” 

Barry watches him, still in shock. Looking at Len like he’s about to suddenly sprout wings or something. Which, to be fair, isn’t all that unheard of in his line of work. 

Len is starting to squirm under the Flash’s gaze, not that he’d ever show signs of that. He puts down his coffee, giving Barry a levelled look. 

“For you it’s been a year almost. Me? I’d say it’s been about four or five months. Time passes differently. And before you go into detail, no spoilers.” 

Barry looks down at that, the light going out of his eyes. He had thought maybe Len had escaped, that the team just had thought he’d died. 

“Miss me that much, Scarlet?” Len’s teasing had a little bit of truth behind it. Surely Barry couldn’t have missed him that much but--then he remembered visiting Barry even further in the future. 

Barry looks like he’s going to cry and that’s--not okay. The younger man sets their drinks down and before Len can even realize it, he’s got long, lean arms wrapped around him. 

Barry is hugging him. 

“It was my fault,” Barry is saying, and Len can feel the other man shaking against him. “I’m sorry. I was the one who--who said you were a hero, that there was good in you. I was the one--you’d be alive if I hadn’t--” 

Len is feeling more and more uncomfortable, both with Barry’s reaction and with his words. He doesn’t want to face his own death. He’s still trying to save his own life. And he certainly doesn’t want Barry to feel responsible for something that was most certainly out of the speedster’s hands. 

But instead he wraps his arms around Barry, sighing. “I’m not dead yet, you know,” Len says, and it’s hard to say those words. It comes out a lot softer than he’d wanted it to. “I’m here, Barry.” 

Barry pulls back, and Len can see that his eyes are wet. “I’m sorry,” he says softly. “I didn’t mean to--just. I just found out a few days ago. I shouldn’t have said anything.” 

“Why?” Len arches an eyebrow at that. “Maybe you can tell me how to prevent it.” 

Barry laughs a little at that. “I would but--you and I both know that would just create more problems.” He looks down. “I want to save you.” 

Len tilts his head, and his eyebrow arches. “I didn’t realize you cared.” Again, instead of teasing, there’s a real question behind it. He thinks of when Barry had kissed him. 

Barry looks up at him this time. “I do,” he says, shivering lightly. “I wish I had gotten the chance to tell you.” 

Len pauses and cups Barry’s jaw. Barry seems more wrecked now emotionally, but seems more open. He thinks of Barry in the future, the one who was cold, who took down all those ARGUS agents and was fine with killing. 

Barry is the Flash, strong and pure and as wild as a lightning bolt. The meta who got superpowers and decided to use them to save the world. He’s fierce and yet has the most compassion, the most heart, more than anyone Len has ever known. 

And Barry believes in Len. 

Len closes the distance between them, kissing Barry. It’s a shock to his system, like getting electrocuted, lighting up every atom in his body. It’s not chaste like their first kiss (or is it their second since it was in Barry’s future?) and instead Barry pours all of his passion, all of his regret for not doing this earlier into it. 

Len wants to drown in Barry, wants to stay here for eternity. 

Eventually they part for air, and Len chases Barry’s lips, wanting more. His lips are tingling, whether from the kiss or from something related to Barry’s powers, Len doesn’t know and doesn’t care. He just wants more. 

Len brings Barry back to him again, kissing him deeply. He slowly backs him up against the wall of the next building, slotting their hips together and--yeah, if Len is going to die then at least he’s going to die happy. 

Len is kissing Barry’s jaw, scraping his teeth along the smooth expanse of skin on his neck when he feels Barry’s hand on Len’s chest. 

“Wait--Leonard--stop.” 

Len pulls back, licking his lips. He’s very proud of the fact that Barry’s eyes track the movement, that the kid looks absolutely wrecked and dishevelled. 

“Not that I’m--complaining. At all. But--why are you here? Is it for…?” He gestures between them and Len just wants to go back to kissing him and tell him that yes, he is here for the sole purpose of having his wicked way with his archnemesis. 

But there is a seriousness in Barry’s eyes, and Len remembers through his haze of lust that for Barry, Len had just died a few days ago. 

The younger man looks up at him, and Len can see all the questions Barry wants to ask but can’t. 

“I didn’t come here to talk about work,” Len says dismissively. “I came for a--personal matter.” 

That piques Barry’s interest, in a way that’s hopeful and wanting. “Personal?” 

Len sighs, shaking his head. “Not this kind of personal. Although this has been a pleasant development. Look, Scarlet, we need to sit down. Have a talk.” 

Barry makes a soft little whine that Len wants to hear so much more of. 

Instead they pick up their drinks and head to a park bench nearby. It’s easier to sit side by side where they don’t want to immediately grab each other and pick up where they left off. 

Len starts. “I’m doing a little...side mission. Off the books. I need someone who is more experienced with meddling in his own timeline.” 

Barry looks betrayed, like this was really what Len was after, like he’s about to give Len a lecture about stealing and whatever criminal activity he thinks Len is going to try when he stops, the last sentence sinking in. 

“You’re going to--you’re trying to interfere with your own timeline?” Barry asks, and it’s like deja vu. Finally he sighs. “I guess it didn’t help I just told you about your future, right?” 

Len pauses, unsure of what to say about that. But Barry shakes his head. “I mean, either that or--by me telling you, it’s cemented it. I’m not really sure how that all works.” 

“That’s what I’m trying to tell you, Barry. I’ve already tried to intervene a few times. No time wraiths or other nasties following me. But--interestingly enough, nothing has actually changed.” 

Barry frowns. “What do you mean?” 

Len explains, telling Barry for the second time about Leo, about Lenny. About his plan. He tells Barry what happened with the Pilgrim, and how Lisa had changed instantly when they put his baby self back, but that Len hadn’t changed with his own interference. 

“I don’t remember meeting myself,” he says, shaking his head. “And other things. I gave myself cash in a time where I didn’t have any. It should have had some kind of impact but it didn’t.” 

Barry frowns. “I--I don’t know,” he admits. “I’ve never tried to interfere using a time ship. Maybe yours is the right way, instead of through the Speed Force. But when I’ve tried to interfere--I’ve interacted with my future selves. I always remember. And when I created Flashpoint, I remembered both timelines until I started to forget this one. You should have some kind of memory. Or maybe--maybe time doesn’t want you to interfere.” 

There’s another thing that is itching in Len’s mind, something he had thought of when he talked to Barry in the beginning. “You and I had a run in next year,” he says. “We talked about this--” 

“Snart, don’t--” 

“You didn’t remember this conversation,” he finishes. Of course he’s not stupid, won’t go into detail about their little mission. He thinks about the kiss from Barry, though. A part of him wants to tell him about that. He wonders if Barry would be jealous of himself and the thought makes him smile a little. 

But Barry frowns. “I--” he pauses. “Look, I only know so much about this stuff. Maybe we should get Cisco to help.” 

Len shakes his head. “No. Out of the question. Loose lips sink ships, and Cisco is the type who could sink the Titanic. The less people involved, the better.” 

And of course, there is another reason he doesn’t want to get Cisco involved. Because this little side mission raises questions, questions that Len isn’t sure he’s comfortable answering. 

“Why do you want to change your past? What are you wanting to change?” Barry frowns, and there are the questions, point blank. “Please tell me it’s not anything criminal.” 

Len rolls his eyes because, honestly? Len could steal the Mona Lisa if he wanted to. 

“You always said there was good in me,” he says instead. “You think I have a chance. So I’m giving myself one. Rewriting the bad memories, fixing the things that went wrong. Giving myself a clean slate.” 

There’s that frown, the soft eyes identical to the one Barry’s future self had given Len last time. 

“I know,” Len cuts Barry off. “Let me guess, you’re going to say something like I don’t have to change my history. That I’m already a good person, whatever.” 

Barry’s mouth closes, and he sighs. “I mean yeah…” 

“My actions now don’t do shit,” he says. “Maybe I can help the team of merry misfits stop Vandal Savage. But that doesn’t take away the body count, that doesn’t take away me dragging my sister into a life of crime. It doesn’t take away from my memories of my childhood. You and I are different in some ways. Both of us have had shitty childhoods, I’ll grant you that. But yours made you good, and mine? Mine made me into my father. And if my life is about to end--I don’t want it to end that way.” 

The statement hangs between them, thick in the air. Barry’s hand reaches out, takes Len’s. It’s like deja vu, except Barry doesn’t look at Len with regret and unspoken wishes. He looks at Len like there’s hope, like there’s a future for them. 

“Leonard--” 

“Len.” 

“Len. I don’t really know what happened but--I do know that you died a hero. To protect your team.” Barry’s eyes are on him and Len can’t take that. He isn’t worthy of Barry Allen’s care. 

Len doesn’t move his hand away, selfishly. He wants to keep touching Barry, pretend that he doesn’t realize Barry’s hand is practically holding his. Funny how moments ago he had his tongue down Barry's throat, but holding hands seems far more intimate. “I’d rather die happy, then. Be the good person you want me to be. I don’t want this life, not if I can help it.” 

Barry gently moves his hand away to take another sip of his drink. He looks like he’s contemplating something. Len immediately wants to pull Barry’s hand back. 

“Len,” he says and it’s soft and firm and Barry’s made up his mind about whatever it is. “I want to help you.” 

And Len isn’t sure what that means, can’t hope what that could mean. So he raises an eyebrow. “So you’ll give me the Wikihow of time travel?” 

Barry shakes his head, those eyes blazing with resolve. “No. I’m not going to do that. Call me selfish, but I don’t want you to die. You want to do this, you’re going to do this right.” 

Len frowns at that, raising one eyebrow. “And that is--?” 

“I’m coming with you.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Len and Mick visit their past selves with the help of Barry. All seems to be going well, until it ends in chaos and talks about Doctor Who.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I made this one more focused on Mick and Len's friendship because honestly, we couldn't change one and leave out the other. I have always seen Mick as on the aro/ace spectrum, and love the idea of him and Len having a queerplatonic relationship because while I don't see them as romantic partners (in this fic) I think what they have transcends typical 'best friends' and that they are life partners.
> 
> Edited slightly for grammar/spelling mistakes.
> 
> I took extreme liberties with this, because this takes place right before Leviathan/River of Time. Also adding another chapter after this one because I couldn't fit it all into one.

**??? **

“Absolutely not,” Rip’s voice is stern, predictably. “Taking him out of his timeline could cause irreparable damage.”

Len opens his mouth for a scathing reply, but Barry’s voice interrupts, firm. “I’m doing this, and after you can drop me off at this exact moment. Plus, if you don’t agree, I have the ability to travel through time with my powers. I can just meet up with you guys in another point in time. So I’m staying.”

“You are coming from a future that directly crosses ours. You’re not even from the same time that this crew left in 2016. Do you know what that could do to the timeline?”

“I don’t know,” Sara’s voice comes in thoughtfully. “He could be a great help at taking down Savage. He knows our team. Barry could be our ace in the hole.”

“And Barry has time travelled before,” Ray points out. Len usually hates that Raymond is so helpful, but to be fair, he’s usually on Len’s side. “He knows not to give away spoilers. It’ll be nice working together.”

“Snart says it’s okay, it’s okay,” Mick crosses his arms. “Red can stay.”

“This is not up for debate!” Rip snaps, following with an exasperated sigh. “Gideon, set a course for December 2016 to drop Mr. Allen back home.”

Len feels his heart sink. He wants to grab Barry’s hand, wants to cling to him. The small touch of intimacy back in the bar has opened up the well, and Len has been starved for affection for too long of his life. Barry’s leaving and he only just got there. Len wants to go too, but he has to stay. He has to finish the mission. He finally has had hope just for it to be taken away.

And then something amazing happens.

“Disregard that, Gideon,” Barry says firmly. His eyes are on Rip challengingly.

“Gideon,” Rip says again with more urgency. “Might I remind you we are on a time sensitive mission and as your captain--”

 _“I’m sorry, Captain,”_ Gideon’s voice is too damn cheerful and Len doesn’t know why he likes that so much. _“My primary protocol is to answer to Mr. Allen’s instructions above all else.”_

Rip deflates instantly, scrubbing a hand over his face. _“Et tu, Gideon?”_ He says it softly, giving in. Len wonders why he isn’t fighting it harder, but doesn’t really care.

“Very well. Mr. Allen, you can temporarily stay here and complete whatever mission you need in exchange for helping us take down Vandal Savage. You can stay in the empty quarters at the end of the hall. You have one week.”

Len tries not to look to happy at that, although something must show on his face because Mick is rolling his eyes and snorting and Sara is smirking way too much for his liking. Len hates them both.

But then Barry turns to Len and his eyes are soft and the warmth radiating from him is almost too much for Len to handle. He clears his throat, leaving Barry behind to catch up with the rest of the crew while Len retreats to his quarters.

\---

The first day is spent on research. Barry speeds into Rip’s study, finding book after book on time travel theory. It takes him about an hour to read through them all even at super speed. He leaves the study in pristine condition and has Gideon promise not to tell Rip.

Rip, surprisingly, doesn’t put up any protests or complaints about Barry staying. In fact, as Barry finds out, Rip is a bit of a Flash fanboy. Barry finds that out after he sees a small section dedicated to the history of Barry Allen and the Flash. Which is something that Barry is not tempted to look through. Not at all. Len snorts when Barry tells him of Rip’s admiration, but really it’s not that much of a surprise.

Barry has given Len the task of writing down the events in his own lifetime, plotting crucial moments where they could best intervene. It’s emotionally difficult and Len complains most of the way. There are too many awful memories, too many secrets he never wants Barry to know about. It ends up devolving into an argument that leaves Barry looking at Len with such empathy that Len almost hates. Len storms out of the room only to come back later and apologize, which is something he rarely does.

They end up compromising, and Len just writes down where he was geographically in certain years. Key points that they might be able to change. The few things that he’s willing to share with Barry get put down on the paper, and if pressed, Len will change the subject and tense up.

Their budding relationship isn’t perfect, but they both knew it wasn’t going to be. Len and Barry are both stubborn, and that is reflected in this side mission. Len’s childhood is a minefield, but Barry’s a superhero with an incredible amount of resilience. Whenever Len blows up and storms off because he doesn’t want to deal with a particular memory, Barry is still there when he comes back, the superhero unfazed. Barry understands what it’s like to have demons, and he knows Len hasn’t let himself process to begin with. He’s lived with crime as a distraction, put up ice walls as his defense.

Plus, to be fair, they’ve only really have been ‘together’ for a day, and before that were somewhat nemeses. They aren’t completely in a relationship and yet--they maneuver around each other as if they’d been together for ages already. There’s something about this between the two of them that Len wants to hang on to, that he knows could be definite. But what he doesn’t know is how long he’ll be sticking around, whether he will die in whatever way Barry has known about, or whether he will cease to exist as he is and become the man he has always wanted to be.

Len is still putting up his defenses with this mission. He still considers Leo to be a kid he has to protect, and hasn’t really come to terms that Leo is himself.

After a stressful first day, they have a tentative plan and have pushed at each other’s emotional comfort zone to take a break until tomorrow.

They head into the common room, and after watching Star Wars and exchanging a few sweet and lazy kisses, Barry and Len fall asleep. Barry’s head is resting in Len’s lap and Len feels content and happy for the first time in a long time. 

\--

The second day, Len breaks.

He tells Barry about his mom--his true mom, not his biological mother. He tells Barry about how close they’d been until she had been taken from him so quickly. The story leaves left Len shaken, a few tears running down his cheeks. He has repressed so much, so many feelings and memories. He is surprised he can still cry.

Len has his head pillowed on Barry’s thigh by the end of it, Barry stroking Len’s short hair. He’d never felt so raw and exposed with another person, had never been so vulnerable. He’d never opened up, or had ever been comforted. It feels nice.

“I haven’t tried to save her,” Len admits, his voice soft. “I keep thinking back to that day that I saw my father cleaning up. I know--I know what happened. Deep down. But I keep thinking that if I go back to that day and see it happen with my own eyes…it’ll make it real. It’s easier to think she’s out sipping a pina colada in Aruba.”

Barry’s lips tug up in a small smile. It isn’t the first time Len has mentioned the island. “Aruba?”

Len stretches out along the sofa, humming. They’re in the entertainment room, shared by the team. But with the team so bent on finding Savage, there isn’t much entertainment to be found.

“When Mick and I had enough money, we were going to retire there,” Len says, closing his eyes. They feel heavy and almost burn from the sting of unshed tears. “Lisa would have her cabana boys, and me and Mick would have a boat. Go fishing, enjoy the beach. We’d be free.”

Barry hums at that, and his fingertips lightly start massaging Len’s scalp. It feels amazing.

Barry makes an amused sound, like a snort. “You would get so bored of that after a week. Nothing to steal or trouble to get into.”

Len feels a smile on his lips, not bothering to open his eyes. “Probably.”

He can’t see it, but he can feel Barry’s fond eyes on him. “I think this is a good place for you here. Being a hero, but you still get to steal and shoot things. And on a team that really cares about you.”

Len opens his eyes and scowls at that, tensing just a little. He doesn’t like how Barry still sees him as a hero. As good. It isn’t him. A part of him wants to tense up, get mad and storm out. But he’s been doing that too often.

The truth is, Len knows that Barry is right. That Len could have been a hero, under different circumstances. That if Len is successful with this mission, he might be the person Barry sees. But the Len of this timeline is jagged, with a darkness in his heart that makes goodness an impossibility.

It’s a new relationship between Barry and Len, but Len is terrified to screw it up and lose Barry both as a romantic partner and as a partner on this mission. And Barry is still treating Len as if he’s catching up, as if Len’s time is still limited, like Len is going to die in the next week. He’s clinging to Len a little too much, and gives in too easily to avoid fights. Len isn’t going to lie, he kind of likes the attention, and has been starved for affection for too long he’ll take it in any way--healthy or not. Which is surprising to Len, because usually when people cling to him, his first instinct is to run away or put a bullet in their chest. But a part of Len wants to run toward Barry and cling to him right back.

When he opens his eyes to say something, he sees that Barry’s are closed. Barry has a small and content smile on his face. The kid looks tired but happy. A part of Len feels warm that he had put that smile on the hero’s face.

He watches Barry for a moment before he hears a small shuffle coming from the doorway.

Mick is standing there with an odd and careful expression on his face. He’s got one eyebrow arched a little, curious. Len still hasn’t told anyone of his and Barry’s new development, but he doesn’t go out of his way to hide it either.

Barry is sound asleep now, and Len gets off the couch to go to his long time partner.

“So you and Red,” Mick says, looking over at Len. His voice is quiet, guarded. Too serious even though his words are teasing. “Always knew you had a thing for him.”

“Someone’s touchy,” Len observes, crossing his arms.

“Didn’t know you’ve been screwing the kid,” Mick says. It’s supposed to sound hurtful, but Len sees it for what it is. Mick thinks Len’s been with Barry since--whenever. That he didn’t tell Mick, or that Barry is the new replacement. Things have been strained between the two of them, and though it’s been getting better Mick doesn’t know where they stand sometimes. Len sometimes doesn’t either.

“It just happened. Right before you, me and Lisa went out for drinks, I visited him,” he says, feeling oddly defensive. He feels like he’s been caught cheating. But honestly, in a way he is. Mick is his partner, his best friend and brother. They haven’t exactly been close lately and here Len is, now shacking up with the enemy. He pauses. “He’s--going to help me on our little side mission. What you and I started early on in ‘72.”

Mick stops at that, letting out a breath. The fight is gone almost immediately. “You still been doing that, Lenny? Going to stop yourself from going rogue?”

Len takes a deep breath, letting out a tired sigh. “I’ve only been able to visit myself a couple more times. It’s tough with Time Dad keeping us on a short leash. But Barry can time travel, and we don’t have to keep taking the little jet pod. It’s easier.” He pauses, looking up at him. “We could be better, Mick. Both of us.”

Mick grunts, and it’s one of disbelief. “No, just you. I’m not a hero, Lenny. Never was. You know what I am.”

Len wants to argue. He does. He knows that Mick is good. He has seen Mick become someone, has seen him grow. Just a little, but it’s there. He knows Mick actually cares about the team, has found a family here.

“I made you that way,” Len says finally. “I saw that we were both broken. And I turned us both into killers. We could have gone down a different path. A better one.”

Mick snorts again, this time saying nothing. Mick has never been the talker, the one with the feelings. But Len had seen Mick interacting with his younger self. He knows Mick never wanted to start the fire, never wanted to kill his parents.

The first time Mick had gotten out of juvie for petty theft, when he and Len had met, Mick wanted to be someone better. He tried, and so did Len. And then the fire happened and Len lost the case and Lisa, and both of them came together to turn their pain and self hatred against the city and go down their path of crime.

The first heist had been Len’s idea, recruiting the young pyro.

He vows to not only save himself, but to save Mick. To do all he can. Mick is his partner in almost every way, and Len wants to have a better life but with Mick still in it.

And now Len knows exactly where they need to go next.

Mick is looking over where Barry is sleeping again. Len wants to explain their closeness. Wants to tell Mick what Barry had been through, that he’s helping prevent Len’s death. But he can’t, and won’t. He doesn’t want to worry his partner, but also--there’s a part of Len that worries his partner won’t care.

“So he’s gonna make you into a real hero,” Mick says, and it’s amused again. He says it dirty, like it’s a double entendre.

Len sees through it, sees Mick and his fear of being replaced. “And you’re still going to help me, right?” He doesn’t mean for it to come out as desperate as it does.

Mick pauses, and then shrugs. “We’re a package deal. Til the end.”

Len feels something loosen inside him, a weight he didn’t know he had lifted from his shoulders. “Rip’s given us a week to fix--me. He doesn’t know what we’re doing. Thinks it’s a quest Barry’s on. We’ve done some planning. We’re going out in the field in the morning.”

Mick is silent, before he shrugs. “I’ll be there tomorrow.”

Len wants to hug him, and it’s an odd irrational thought. They barely even touch. Mick would probably punch Len if he hugged him. “Come unarmed.”

Mick leaves, and Len lets out a sigh of relief. It’s good that Mick is on his side. He was scared of losing him, honestly.

He turns back toward the room and sees Barry stir, rubbing his eyes. Len’s heart skips a beat. He wants this--wants to just explore everything new between himself and Barry. But he knows he can’t. Even if he doesn’t actually die, Len is planning on changing. He’s going to.

He sees Barry blearily blink in confusion at the room, before the speedster spots Len and focuses. Len can tell when Barry remembers where he is, what’s happened. The sleepy smile on Barry’s face nearly breaks Len for the second time today.

“You should get some sleep, Scarlet,” Len says. “We’ve got a big day tomorrow.”

Barry gets up and stretches, and then looks at Len shyly. “Do you--wanna sleep in my room?”

It’s technically Carter’s old room before he died and that kinda creeps Len out, but he is not yet a saint and the thought of curling up next to a warm and sleepy Barry Allen seems like heaven.

Len lets Barry thread their fingers together on the way out.

\---

**1990**

Barry, Mick and Len arrive in Central City in 1990, about four months after they had dropped Mick’s younger self off from the Pilgrim, and a year after Len had last met with his younger self.

Lenny is eighteen, and almost a force to be reckoned with, and the young Mick is just out of prison. It had been a very short sentence, ruled an accidental fire, and because it’s Mick’s parents who died, the judge had let Mick off easy with involuntary manslaughter and a couple months inside.

In his original timeline, Len had found Mick after the pyro was out and the two lived together for a while, trying to come up with a way to fix their lives until after a few months of starving, they had given into their talents.

This is a crucial time for both Len and Mick, and Len is hoping the money he gives Lenny can help prevent them from taking drastic measures.

Barry speeds the three of them to the apartment where their younger selves currently reside. They haven’t really gone over a plan, except that this would be a good point in time to try to intervene.

In retrospect, Len wishes they had discussed the details a little more beforehand. That would have prevented the argument that ensues.

“You two stay here,” Len says, feeling more reserved, vulnerable. He wants to pull his coat closer around him but resists the urge.

“Len, I thought--”

“You’ve gotta be fucking--”

“I have a rapport with...Lenny,” he interrupts them, the name almost foreign on his lips. “He might not trust either of you two.”

“What happened to wanting to change me?” Mick demands, and it’s the beginning of a storm Len doesn’t want to bring on. “We’re partners. And you know damn well that I’m in that place too.”

Len sighs, then rubs his forehead. It’ll be harder to explain this to Lenny, but Mick is right. “Fine. But you don’t call yourself Mick. And as far as you know, my name is Sam.” He doesn’t look at Barry when he says that. “And do not mention time travel or who we really are.”

Mick scowls. “Not an idiot.”

“I didn’t say you are,” Len says, because it’s true. Mick is smart, just in different areas than some of the people on the team. He’s intuitive, knows how to take apart his heat gun and put it back together again, and knows more scientific facts about fire than any scientist Len has ever met. “But neither of us can mess this up.”

He turns to Barry, and honestly, he really hates those puppy eyes.

“Stand out here, keep guard,” Len tells him. “The three of us going in would be too much. If it looks like we need it, I’ll call you.”

Barry’s puppy eyes intensify, and there is a small crease on his forehead from his frown. Len doesn’t like it at all.

He sighs and gently puts a hand on Barry’s elbow, leaning in so Mick doesn’t hear. “I don’t want you to see...me like this. But more than likely. I’ll need you after.”

It seems to appease Barry, and the crease on his forehead smooths out. Barry has been an advocate for Len opening up to him or at least doing some form of self-care. Len can’t really put his finger on it, but he trusts Barry. Maybe it’s because they are so similar, that Barry has gone through similar circumstances.

Barry nods, then gives him a small and teasing smile. He leans in to give Len a sweet and chaste kiss. “You just don’t want me to see how cute you were back then.”

Len snorts, and the tension dissipates. He looks to his partner in crime. “Shall we?”

As always, Mick is by his side.

They head up to the second floor of the apartment where the two had stayed. It brings up an odd feeling of nostalgia, especially having Mick by his side. The building is a lot dirtier than he remembers.

He knocks on the door, letting out a breath. He’s more tense than the last time.

The door opens and--

Mick hasn’t aged that much.

Twenty-year old Mick answers the door, young and with a head full of hair. He looks at Len for a long moment, then eyes his older self with suspicion, and something else unreadable.

“You’re not the pizza guys,” young Mick says with a scowl.

“Observant,” the older snorts, and Len ribs him in the side.

“Who is it, Mick?” Lenny’s voice comes from further inside the apartment.

“Some old guys at the door,” young Rory says, and Len and Mick both scowl at that. Rory turns to them. “You cops?”

“Furthest from that,” Len rolls his eyes. He and Lenny meet eyes.

He’s surprised that Lenny actually looks somewhat happy to see him. Lenny comes over to the door, right behind Rory. “Relax, Mick. He’s...my uncle. Distant. He’s the one who’s giving us the money.”

Rory looks at Len, frowning. Then finally he pulls back, no longer as threatening. It astounds Len how much Mick was loyal to him, protective of him even then. “He looks like you.” Rory is observant, and Len know they need to be careful.

Lenny gestures for them to come in, and they do. Mick is behind Len, surveying the apartment. Remembering. Lenny sits on the loveseat that Len doesn’t remember ever owning. Mick and Len sit across from him.

“So who’s your friend?” Lenny asks, his face guarded. He’s wondering what brings them here.

“This is my partner,” Len says, pausing as he thinks of an alias they hadn’t used yet in the timeline. “Lincoln.”

Lenny’s eyebrows raise so high up that it almost gives Len a phantom pain. “Partner? I mean, that’s dope. It’s the 90s and all.”

Len wonders if he was always such a little shit (and by the amused expression on Mick’s face, the answer is yes). He also wonders why he ever used the word ‘dope’ and is glad he had stopped.

“We work together. Me and him have been close friends for almost thirty years. More like brothers.” He pauses, because it’s not like his past self is homophobic, but Len remembers what it’s like to have almost no one who was similar in identity to him when he was younger. “Not that I’m actually straight.”

Lenny snorts, but he relaxes. Len can tell that Lenny feels more at ease to know that there’s someone else who is queer in his life. Rory sits down across from them, next to Lenny. The two are a perfect mirror image of their future selves, right down to the way that Len and Lenny have one leg crossed over the other. Rory’s still looking at Mick intently, as if Mick is going to attack him.

Lenny looks at Len, getting down to business. “So, to what do I owe the pleasure? Here to try to save my soul again? Cause I gotta say, didn’t work so well the last time.”

Len sighs deeply.

“I know things have been...tough for you and your friend. I thought I’d do something, give you some more money to tide you over.” He takes out the envelope, placing it on the small coffee table.

Len sees Rory’s eyes widen, and out of nowhere the young pyro puts a hand on Lenny’s arm, stopping him from picking it up. Rory glares at them.

And then everything goes to hell.

“He’s not your uncle, Lenny.”

\--

Lenny reacts instantly, a pistol pointed directly at Len. Len knows Lenny had had it at his hip even as relaxed as he had been. Lenny had probably retrieved it before going to the door.

“What are you talking about, Mick?” Lenny asks, glaring at the two of them.

Rory looks over at Mick, then at Len. “I remember you. From the metal room. Whatever the hell it was. You kidnapped me and made me watch over some baby. You put me in some house and told me--” He’s pulling, remembering something as if it were from a dream. Finally he locks onto his older self. “You told me that you’re me. From the future.”

Shit. Shit.

Lenny pauses, finally looking at Mick. Really looking at him. His eyes move from Mick to Rory, seeing how similar they look. Mick is broader, has a shaved head, and has more scars and lines on his face. And Len--

He can tell the moment when Rory _sees_ Len.

“Lenny...he looks just like you.”

“That’s impossible,” Lenny says, and Len can see his younger self’s finger on the trigger twitching. “Time travel. That’s something outta TV. Not real. So talk. Tell me the damn truth. Whatever you did to Mick a few months ago was a hoax.”

Len swears, closes his eyes. This is exactly why he didn’t want anyone else to come along. Still, it looks like the charade is up.

Len looks up at his younger self, his gaze fixed on him. “Ask yourself this, kid. Every time I visit you, I haven’t aged a bit. When I met you when you were three, when I met you when you were eight, and now. That’s almost twenty years. And I haven’t aged. I know about your life. Because I lived it.”

Lenny still doesn’t look convinced. Mostly because Len knows a part of his younger self wants it to be true.

So Len continues, as if this all bores him. “My name is Leonard Snart. Len. I had a shit father who taught me how to steal, how to survive and when I was older I ended up falling down that path no matter how hard I tried not to. Eventually I became a very notorious criminal with my partner Mick Rory at my side.”

“That’s not exactly private information,along with some creative imagination at the end.” Lenny says and glares. “Is this why you were giving me money? Is this some long con?”

Len growls in frustration. To the surprise of everyone in the room, including himself, he takes off his parka, then his sweater, revealing the thin gray undershirt he wears. His scars are on display, and he can see Leo’s eyes tracking them.

“You have a scar on your collarbone from a broken beer bottle your father threw at you the day he caught you in bed with Darren O’Malley when you were fifteen. Another is a cigarette burn on your arm from a day when you talked back to him, when you tried to protect Lisa from him when you were twelve. Your pinkie and ring finger on your left hand don’t bend the same way after he crushed them with a hammer when you botched up a heist at eleven years old. Or how you don’t like a certain brand of hot sauce after he poured an entire bottle down your throat for talking back to him when you were--”

_“Lenny, stop.”_

The words are coming from Mick, and that surprises him. Len feels the words and memories bubble up, spill out. He has never talked about his scars. Never talked about the way his body is a minefield of terrible memories. He only really loves the cold because he can cover himself up with layers.

Len looks at his younger self. Lenny has lowered the gun, and there are tears in his eyes. Lenny looks as though Len has inflicted all of that damage himself. Len has hardly dealt with the memories until recently, at forty five, and Lenny is not at all prepared.

“Get the fuck out of my house,” Lenny says, and it’s shaky and wobbly. He’s curled in on himself in a way Len remembers. He used to do that when his dad was around. He’s trying to stand tall, to look menacing, but Len and Mick can both see through that.

Len looks at Rory, who looks just as freaked out. It’s a lot to take in, a tall tale indeed, yet completely true. Len wants to comfort the younger, to reach out to both of their younger selves.

Instead, Rory stands between Len and Lenny, puffing himself up. “You heard him.”

Len’s heartbeat is racing. He’s feeling close to a panic attack himself. It’s--something he hadn’t experienced since he was younger. He’d gotten better at compartmentalizing.

Hastily, Len scribbles out his number, giving it to the two of them. It’s a burner cell phone that only works in time periods where there are cell towers, or within fifty miles of the Waverider. “If you change your mind, call.”

Len knows when he needs to back off, when a battle is lost but the war is still not over. He’s still not sure he can handle it.

\---

Len, Barry and Mick go out to a Saints ‘n’ Sinners, or as it was called twenty years ago, DiMaggio’s. It’s a small little dive bar that is decorated with glow in the dark stars and planets on the ceiling, and is filled with the stench of stale tobacco. It’s still another six years before Central City bans smoking indoors, and another ten before Len buys the bar. But even though the walls are different, the layout is different, the patrons are too much of a college crowd--but it’s still his bar, still home. Still familiar.

Mick and Barry have not said anything to Len on the way there. He can tell by the way Barry is looking at Len that Mick had found a way to inform Barry of what had happened. In a way he’s grateful, in a way he’s also feeling exposed. A part of him wants to snarl at them and push them away, and yet another part of him wants to curl in between his best friend and romantic partner and feel their comfort.

The reveal feels more like a failure than a win. Len had calculated everything so perfectly. He could count on his own reactions for small changes. Manipulating Lenny into believing he was family, that Len was a nice relative wanting to help a kid out. Instead Lenny knows who Len is. A failure, a crook. Just like his father. That Len has been using Lenny to get something that Len wants, that Len is selfish.

“I shouldn’t have come.” Mick’s voice surprises Len, and the thief looks up at his friend. Mick looks guilty, or at least, Len can tell that Mick has guilt lurking behind his expressionless face.

“It wasn’t your fault,” Len says and he sighs. “Seems like whatever was supposed to wipe your past self’s memories didn’t work as well as we’d hoped. Though it does change the plan now that they know who we are.”

The trio falls silent, Len looking miserable. Barry and Mick are trying their best to comfort Len while knowing how skittish he is right now.

“Expect the plan to go off the rails,” Barry speaks up, and both Mick and Len give him a small little smile.

“Throw away the plan,” Len has a genuine smile on his face, though it’s small.

“You have too many feelings in this,” Mick tells Len. “You gotta stop looking at him as a mark and start looking at him as you.”

Barry nods. He’s sitting next to Len, and reaches out to twine their fingers together. “You have a lot of emotion you’re trying to shove to the side. I know it’s hard. But in order to help him...both of them. You need to try to embrace those emotions, stop bottling them up. The only way you’re going to help is--” Barry purses his lips as he finishes the unintentional pun. “--to be honest with yourself.”

Len gives him a glare with no heat. “You’re spending too much time around me.”

Barry grins, and it loosens a part of the darkness wrapping itself around Len’s heart.

Len turns to his drink, but it’s empty. He sighs, ready to order another one when he feels Barry squeeze his hand.

“Allow me,” the speedster says.

There is a waitress who is bringing a round of shots to a nearby table. Len feels a loss of contact for a moment, a rush of wind, and then there are three full shots in front of him. He sees the waitress on the other side of the room hand the table the remaining shots, realize she’s short handed and then head back to the bar with a confused frown.

Mick takes one of the pilfered shots and downs it, nodding at Barry. “I like him. Thanks, Red.”

Barry grins at that, nudging his share of the spoils to Len. Len knows Barry can’t get drunk, and so he gladly takes it.

He’s just downed one of the stolen shots, and is about to take another when he feels the phone vibrate in his pocket.

He fumbles with it for a moment before he leans in a corner to answer it. He knows cell phones aren’t completely unheard of right now but they are certainly not as sophisticated as even the cheap flip phone Len has.

He knows who’s on the other end, but the sound of his own voice still surprises him.

_“You wanna talk, let’s talk.”_

\---

This time, Barry comes along with them inside the apartment.

Lenny eyes him, and it’s an odd feeling that Len realizes his younger self is closer to Barry’s age than Len himself is. Its weird.

“I’m Barry,” the speedster introduces himself, eyes bright and fond. Len can see his past self already tongue tied, and he hadn’t realized how open he used to be with some reactions. Although it’s nice to know that in any part of his timeline he’d be attracted to Barry. “I’m a friend of...well. You.”

Lenny tries to play it cool, shrugging. He sits on the couch, Rory beside him.

“So you’re telling me, you’re our future selves,” Lenny says. “That somehow twenty years down the road me and Mick become some supervillains that can time travel. Is this--does everyone do that?”

“We’re not here to discuss those details,” Len says, and he’s practically perched on the couch as if ready to bolt in a moment’s notice. “We’re here to stop certain things from happening.”

“Can you do that?” Lenny frowns. “Let’s say I believe you’re really us from the future. I’ve seen enough Star Trek and Doctor Who to know that that’s a time paradox. You coming back in your past to prevent something from happening. If it changes, you never exist, so you never existed to be able to go back in time at all.”

“You watch Doctor Who and Star Trek?” Barry brightens, and it’s almost teasing except that Barry is a giant nerd and he almost sounds excited too. “Wrath of Khan is one of my favorite movies, hands down. Picard is so much better than Kirk, though.”

Lenny looks at Barry, and his lips twitch a little. Len is doing the same, identical expressions on their face.

“Nerds,” Rory says, and it’s fond until he remembers himself. He looks at them, his temper ending the moment. “So what do you want? You gonna kidnap us again and make us watch more babies?”

“We kidnapped you to save your skin,” Mick growls at his younger self. “And that baby you were looking after was him.” He looks at Lenny. “So I’d shut your trap.”

_“Mick.”_

It comes from two identical voices, Len and Lenny. Their lips curl in amusement at the same time.

Len knows himself well enough that he knows Lenny is thinking how cool this is. That it’s science fiction come true. To be fair, there’s a part of Len that thinks so too.

He reclines back, settling in a little better. “We made some mistakes in our life. Ones that we don’t want to be repeated.”

Lenny frowns at that, but both boys are silent.

“When Mick and I were staying here, we didn’t have much money. We were trying to get by, trying to go straight. But it’s hard to get a job with a rap sheet, and without any education. Mick had just served his sentence for burning down the house. And I had just lost a court case which would have given me custody over Lisa.”

Lenny lets out a breath at that. The case is still ongoing, but hearing the result is still a punch in the gut. “So you’re here to fix that?”

“Not quite,” Len says, and it’s almost sad. “Dad had too many officials in his pocket. There was no way I’d win. I lost all of the money Mick and I had left. We were broke. We were behind on our rent, and we were looking at being evicted, living on the streets. We turned to the one thing we were good at. I would plan heists just like Daddy dearest taught me. We’d rob a store at night, pickpocket. Pay our rent that way. At first it was just here and there to tide us over, and then over time…”

“It became our life,” Mick finishes for him. “A fun one.”

“With a lot of unnecessary killing,” Barry reminds Mick. “You became criminals, supervillains, but you know deep down you’re actually good people.”

That earns Barry four mirrored scowls in his direction.

Len sighs. “He’s--not wrong. I wouldn’t say we’re necessarily good, but we’re not as bad as we made ourselves. There’s still hope.” He pauses, looking at Lenny. “We turn into our father. That’s not something I want for you.”

Lenny pauses, looking at the envelope of money Len had placed on the table before, untouched, and then back at Len. His eyes show how deep in thought he is, contemplating Len as if figuring him out. Finally, the younger shakes his head.

“No,” Lenny says, looking at Len with a jaw set. “You’re not our father. You--you came back to try to help me. Dad never gave a shit about me or Lisa. He was fine when I was starving and living on the streets. You went back in time to look out for me. You and I are survivors. I--” He swallows. “I don’t think you’re all that bad.”

Len feels it hit him like an icicle to the chest. There’s something--validating about that. As if he never cared about anyone’s approval but his own. Len never speaks so openly about things unless he truly believes it. He feels maybe Lenny could see that Len needs to hear it, that maybe--maybe Len really isn’t as terrible as he thinks he is.

Still.

“Maybe,” Len muses. He’s uncomfortable at how emotional this conversation is. He wants to bolt, but he feels like something is changing. “Either way, you don’t need to go down this path. You have other options.”

“And what happens then?” Rory asks, scowling. “Sounds to me like a fun life.”

“Always wanted to be a firefighter,” Mick says, thinking. “Control the flames, watch things burn.”

Lenny stops, then looks between the two. His eyes trail over Barry, noticing that Barry has his hand on Len’s. Finally, he looks up at his older self.

“We won’t be where you are,” Lenny says. “Relationships, friendships--even the time travel shindig. It’ll all be different.”

Len gently squeezes Barry’s hand. “I know.”

Barry looks at Lenny, giving him a small smile. “I’ll remember. And--it’s a long story, but if anything. I’ll find you. Check in to see how you’re doing.”

Lenny looks away, and Len can tell it flusters his younger self to find someone so invested in him.

Lenny looks away and then sighs. Finally, he nods. “Fine. I’ll--I’ll listen. Do what I have to, I guess.”

Len feels himself smile, rare and genuine as he feels a weight lifted off of him. He gets out a small list, then begins to talk about his life, and this time he doesn’t feel the need to run away.

\--

“--superhero. We actually met as arch nemeses.”

Len overhears Barry and Lenny talking in the kitchen. He’s hidden from sight, and is curious about the conversation.

He hears a derisive snort from Lenny, his trademark drawl just barely in his voice. “How romantic.”

He can’t see it but he knows Barry is blushing and smiling. “We are. But it’s more--I see a lot of potential in him. In you. Me and you--had very similar lives as a kid. Traumatic.”

“Your parents.” There’s something in Lenny’s voice that tells Len that Barry had explained his backstory. “And yet you became the sunshine and rainbows superhero and I became…”

Lenny says something that Len can’t hear.

“He’s not bad. And neither are you.” Barry’s conviction is strong. “Deep down, you’re a good person, Len. If you weren’t, none of us would be here trying to help you. And its not me trying to save you. It’s not. It’s more...I wish you could see what I see.”

Len hears a shuffling sound. Lenny’s voice is quiet. “And what about you and him? Kind of a shitty way to break up if he doesn’t exist.”

Barry has a small smile in his tone. “I can find you. I will find you again. I like him. You. A lot. Not just the tough exterior but everything else. When I get my speed, I’ll find you again. And we’ll--we’ll see what happens. But most of all I just want you to be happy.”

There’s a long pause. “This is weird. All of this.”

“I know.”

And then Barry is leaving the kitchen and Len pretends like he never heard any of it.

\--

“Why haven’t we changed?” Mick scowls as they enter the ship. Barry’s frown is growing deeper.

“I was wondering that too,” Len says. “I don’t remember meeting us back when we were younger. You?”

Mick shakes his head.

“Oh, Gideon,” Len sing-songs frustratedly. “Tell me about our timeline?”

_“I am sorry, Mr. Snart, but it appears neither yours nor Mr. Rory’s timelines have been altered.”_

Len shudders and it has nothing to do with the cold. Barry frowns and looks at him. “Maybe it just needs time.”

Len feels all the hope drain from him at once.

They don’t go back after that.

\--

**???**

“Lenny?”

Barry’s voice is soft yet feels so loud in the quiet room. He and Len are laying together, breathless and sated, nothing between them except the cool sheets. Barry’s fingers are tracing lazy patterns on Len’s bicep, and Len has his eyes closed. He’s never felt so content until this moment. Has experienced sex many times but up until now has never experienced what it’s like to be...intimate. It’s a high.

He almost drifts off before he remembers vaguely that Barry had called to him. Lenny. A sweet term of endearment that now reminds him of a person he couldn’t save.

“Lenny.”

Len grunts in response, not opening his eyes. He’s content and warm in this perfect little bubble. He doesn’t want to shatter it.

“I don’t care if we didn’t change things,” Barry’s voice sounds almost far away. He’s lost in thought. “I like you for the way you are.”

The perfect little bubble shatters and Len opens his eyes now. “You wanted me to change.”

Barry shakes his head, his eyes soft and sad. “It’s never been about that. I saw how much you’ve been through. How much pain you’ve felt. And despite all of that...despite you being a criminal and a thief, deep down you’re a good guy who’s gone through a terrible life. I just wanted to see you happy.” He pauses, fingers tracing Len’s lips gently. “When they told me you had died...I felt like a part of me had been taken too. You died a hero, and that was my fault. I don’t know what happened, but I know you had sacrificed yourself to save the team. You wouldn’t have if I hadn’t tried to bring out that good in you. So when you told me about the mission I thought--maybe I could have both. That you’d be happier, that you’d be the better person I know you want to be. But more than that...that by changing some things, maybe you’d still be alive.”

Len falls quiet. He keeps forgetting that Barry is from a near future and not from the moment they had left off. He keeps forgetting that he will be dying soon, and that he has nothing to show for it.

Barry continues. “I don’t know why things aren’t different. You should be able to remember meeting--well, us. I don’t know. Maybe Rip makes us go back and give you memory pills. Or maybe--maybe time does want to happen.” He looks down. “But you aren’t going to die. Another reason I came here was because it was a fail safe. If we weren’t successful in your mission, then I would make sure you wouldn’t be the one to die.”

Len looks up at Barry. A part of him wants to push him away. It’s almost a natural instinct that never seems to fade. It isn’t that Barry is seeing someone else in Len. It’s that he’s seeing through Len, that he’s seeing past all the walls Len has put up and he still believes in him. It’s that part that scares Len; it’s too much.

“I’m a lost cause, Barry,” he says, and he doesn’t know if he means changing his past or his future. He places a kiss to the curve of Barry’s shoulder, nipping gently at the skin. “So how about we stop with all these exhausting emotions and put our time to better use?”

He can still see in Barry’s eyes that they aren’t finished with their conversation. But then Barry’s frown fades and the heat and want is there instead.

Barry’s lips meet Len’s and it’s just as exhilarating as the first time, just as electric. Len will never get tired of his kisses. The kiss turns wet, dirty and heated and in the next second, the speedster has Len on his back as he’s straddling Len.

Len lets his hands fall on the curve of Barry’s hip, nipping at his lower lip. Then--

“Did you hear that?” Len asks, pausing. There is something off, something not right in the sounds coming from outside.

“Mmhm,” Barry replies absently, too distracted with kissing down Len’s throat.

He gives in to the feeling for a few more seconds and then there. He hears it again.

“Barry.” His voice is serious enough that Barry pulls back, pupils dilated. Len can feel the power running through the speedster and it’s amazing. “Something’s wrong.”

Barry blinks the lust-addled haze away, frowning. “What is it?”

Len gently rolls out from under Barry, getting up and heading toward the closed door, listening. He’s completely naked and too on edge to be unashamed. There are too many footsteps outside, too heavy to be his crew.

“Barry. We need to get dressed. And to find somewhere to hide.”

He can hear the scuffles coming closer.

“What? Why do we need to hide?” Barry frowns, but he’s picking up his clothes already, implicitly trusting Len.

Len utters the one word that Barry knows from Len’s past, the code word that Mick and Len have used when they have that gut feeling that something wrong is going to happen. It’s the word that has Barry speeding around the room getting dressed, then sloppily dressing Len and speeding them off to the hiding spot Len knows.

Alexa.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who has taken the time to read, comment and/or leave kudos!
> 
> This chapter in the beginning borrows heavily from the actual script, but there are some slight changes since Barry is with them. I didn't mean to write Sara out because I absolutely adore her, but I think with Barry on board occupying all of Len's time that Len wouldn't be bugging her like he did in that episode, and instead she'd be out there kicking Time Master ass.
> 
> Very, very brief mention of past Coldatom.

The team, it appears, has been captured. 

Barry and Len exit the hidden corridor that runs from a vent inside Len’s room and leads underneath the Waverider’s bridge. He’s pretty sure they’re sitting in some hangar in the Time Master’s hold. If the team has been captured, they’ll soon realize that Len is nowhere to be found. 

“It’s empty,” Barry says, looking around. “You really think they’ve been captured?” 

“It wouldn’t be the first time the Time Masters played us,” Len frowns and rolls his eyes. Honestly, Rip was an idiot for ever believing otherwise. He goes to the cockpit, toward the controls. “Let's get out of here, Flash. We don’t have time for this.” 

“What about the team?” Barry frowns, and Len has to stop himself from rolling his eyes. It’s too easy to forget that Barry is not just another do gooder, but also one that he’s dating. Len’s hackles are raised, which means that his drawl and snark are out in full force. 

“There’s nothing more we can do for them,” Len says with a shrug. He has that horrible feeling in the pit of his stomach, reminding him that Mick is a part of that equation. 

Barry knows him well. “What about Mick?” 

“If the Time Masters are half as twisted as Mick said, there’s an excellent chance that Mick is no longer Mick,” he scowls, crossing his arms. Honestly, he’s a little scared shitless at that thought. 

Barry sighs, gently putting a hand on Len’s arm. “You and I both know we’re going in there to save the rest of the team. It’s the only choice we have. We’re surrounded anyway, so it’s not like we can actually leave.” 

Len nearly wrenches himself out of Barry’s grasp, despite him wanting to lean into the speedster. “Or, we can blast our way out, escape to freedom, and be living on some tropical island sipping Mai Thai’s. Alive. Maybe you can speed us out of here, Flash.” 

Barry’s voice is more firm. “Snart, I said no.” 

So Barry is going back to calling him the enemy. If he wants to play that, Len is more than willing. In a second, he has the Cold gun out of its holster and pointed right at Barry’s heart. “Maybe I didn’t make myself clear.” 

Barry looks unimpressed, and instead walks to Len and gently puts his hands on the arm Len is using to hold the gun. “Lenny.” He says, and it’s soft, sympathetic. Len is too stubborn to let it show that Barry has an effect on him. “I know you care about this team. That you’re scared. And it’s okay. But I meant what I said. We will save them. Stop playing the villain when we know you’re not.” 

Len’s eyes are angry, and yes, there is fear deep down. But he wants to make his words bite. Wants to make Barry angry. Wants to push him away because that’s all he knows how to do when backed into a corner. “We both know that’s not true. If I were this good guy deep down, Barry, you wouldn’t have failed trying to change me.” 

He sees the hurt in Barry’s eyes, and Len hates himself for causing it. But he’s nothing if not stubborn, and he’s hoping that Barry will get so wound up that he will either speed them out out of spite or pity or maybe really start a fight with Len as a distraction. 

Barry takes another step into his space and Len charges up the gun, finger on the trigger. Barry hesitates, then closes his eyes as he leans forward as if to embrace Len and Len has no choice but to keep playing this game of chicken and pull the trigger-- 

The phone rings. 

Len is still too angry, both at Barry and at himself to answer. Len is at war with himself, angry at Barry for insinuating himself and having so much power over him and his feelings, but also angry at himself for his own behavior and relieved that nothing happened. Barry spares a glare at Len, then goes to the phone. He picks it up, and after a moment he brightens. 

“Gideon!” Barry says excitedly, as if the entire moment has gone away. 

Len is still angry, of course, but honestly there is something in Barry’s expression that sends a pang of longing through him. He wants to just hurry up with this little lover’s spat so those bright and warm eyes can be directed at him again. 

“Gideon,” Barry says after what sounds like a long moment of Gideon rambling on the phone. “Is the team still okay? Are they alive? Do you know where they are?” 

Barry gets out his phone and seems to be taking notes on what Gideon is saying. Len feels a rush of affection, mixing with his still sour mood. 

“Thank you, Gideon. I’m glad you’re alive.” He says with a happy smile. 

Barry hangs up the phone and turns to Len. The hope on his face eases a tension that was coiled in Len. 

“Gideon has a plan. She knows where they’re being held,” he says. He takes a step toward Len. 

“I figured as much from what I heard,” Len says, and it feels awkward now. He can’t help feel the guilt that’s crawling over him. 

Barry takes another step forward, pauses, then looks at Len’s expression. He must see something there because he moves the rest of the way, putting his hands on Len’s shoulders. Len relaxes, and then Barry slowly and tentatively embraces Len, as if the thief is a skittish animal. 

Len’s arms hang awkwardly at his side, conflicted. Finally he puts the cold gun back in his holster, then gently puts his hands on Barry’s back to return the embrace, stiff as it is. “Barry--” he tries, but he doesn’t even know what he’s about to say and his voice trails off. 

Barry looks up at him, his eyes warm and sincere. “It’s okay. You don’t have to say it. Just--make it up to me by trusting me?” 

Len closes his eyes, and honestly, he can do that. Words are meaningless, actions are another. Len had found this out at an early age when Lewis would apologize for hitting Len’s mother, or sometimes Len, and promise he wouldn’t again. The apologies stopped early on, but Len never forgot how hollow the words had been. 

No matter what Len does, he can’t help but feel like he’s becoming his father. 

Still, Len wants to be able to have a healthy relationship. Barry makes him want to have that. He instead takes one of Barry’s hands and brings it up to his lips, kissing it gently. 

“I trust you, Barry.” He says, and then the moment is over and Len raises an eyebrow, speaking in his playful drawl. “Now let’s get on with it, Flash. What bad idea does Gideon have?” 

\-- 

Barry is gone for a few crucial seconds, as part one of Gideon’s plan to lay a code to rewrite the Time Masters’ ships’ AIs. Len barely has time to move by the time he’s back. 

It’s a waiting game, which is something Len hates. Of course, the real disappointment is when Barry turns down Len’s offer for a quickie while they wait, the speedster too afraid of literally getting caught with their pants down. 

Still, there is something to be said for the intimacy between the two. Len is laying down on the floor with Barry spooned up against him, practically on his lap. Len is pressing sweet apologetic kisses to Barry’s neck and their fingers are tangled together. 

Barry’s playing with the ring on Len’s pinkie finger, the one that Len has had since his and Mick’s first heist, back when they were practically kids. 

“Mick tells me this is your wedding ring,” Barry says, chuckling. 

“You and Mick teaming up against me is probably the scariest thing right now,” Len says teasingly. He kisses Barry’s jaw. “Of course, I only say that now, since I know adding my sister into the mix will make that ten times as worse.” 

Barry leans into the kisses, turning his head to gently meet Len’s lips, the kiss slow and unhurried. Barry pulls back, closing his eyes. “Mick said you got that ring about two months after we visited your younger selves.” 

Len looks down, nodding. “Our first heist.” He feels his heart sink. “I was hoping to avoid creating that memory in him.” 

Barry squeezes Len’s hand gently, comforting. “Don’t, Lenny. Don’t beat yourself up. I don’t know why things didn’t change, but it’s okay. I’m glad I have you, as you are. And besides...at least some version of you had someone looking out for him.” 

Len feels it ease a little bit of guilt. “Considering we’re trading our lives to try to rescue the team, I’d say it’s pretty even.” 

As the words leave his lips, he feels the realization hit him full force. He can’t explain how he knows, can’t explain why. But he knows that this right here is it. 

This is when Len dies. 

_“Mr. Allen, the time drive is back online.”_ Gideon’s voice interrupts. Barry doesn’t seem to have had the same revelation that Len does. 

Instead, Barry stands up, holding out a hand to help Len up. As he pulls Len to stand, he places a sweet and chaste kiss on Len’s lips and Len can’t help return the smile. 

Then Barry turns to the control panel and Len watches in fascination as he goes from sweet and warm Barry Allen to the fearless and strong Flash. 

They strap themselves in as the ship leaves the hangar, Barry steering the ship. It’s bumpy and choppy, as Sara and Rip are the only real pilots and neither are present. But they get out just fine, making a jump for where the Time Masters are holding the team, the Vanishing Point, the-- 

_Oculus._

Len doesn’t know where that word comes from, why it’s in the forefront of his mind. But he knows that that’s what it’s called, that’s where it is. He just doesn’t know what it actually is. 

But he knows that’s where he needs to be. 

\-- 

Len rescues the team from the cell. They’ve never been so relieved to see him. 

The brainwashing has not worked on Mick. Len doesn’t find this out until after Mick, dressed in Chronos gear has a gun pointed at Len but instead fires on the Time Masters. When Mick takes off the helmet, Len wants to hug him. He blames Barry for instilling this awful urge to want physical comfort. 

They save the team and Barry whisks them all back onto the time ship. 

Len and Barry are helping the professor in the medical bay, who is sick without the other half of Firestorm. Len feels the ship lurch into movement, and despite his hatred for rollercoasters, he can’t help but feel relieved that they’re free at last. 

Still, he can’t shake the feeling that something is calling to him. 

\-- 

The Time Masters have a device called the Oculus. 

The words replay over and over in Len’s head. He doesn’t know why. He can’t have heard it from anywhere else. He thinks maybe Mick had mentioned it in his time as Chronos, but Mick seems just as surprised. 

“--I’m saying that they’ve been engineering our lives to move in very specific directions, and we are playing out that script even now,” Rip is saying. Len has barely listened to the conversation since the Oculus was mentioned, but now his attention has caught on to the conversation again. 

“That’s why the timeline isn’t changing,” Barry says, frowning. “If what you say is true, then anything directly related to the timeline that they want can’t be affected because of this device.” 

Len is looking at Barry. He wonders if Barry has reached the same conclusion that Len has. But there’s still a frown on his face that Len thinks maybe he’s only halfway there. 

“So we destroy the Oculus, we free the timelines,” Ray says. “We do the one thing they don’t want us to do. We destroy it.” 

“But how do we do that if we know the Time Bastards are pulling our strings?” Len asks, frowning. 

“Time Master Druce told me that the Oculus’ abilities don’t work if we’re actually inside the Vanishing Point,” Rip says. “Most likely because it exists outside of time.” 

Len goes quiet again while the rest of the team talks. Barry seems to notice, but says nothing about it to Len. Instead, the speedster faces the team. “They still don’t know I’m on board. We can use that to our advantage.” 

Rip looks at Barry, and Len can tell a fanboy when he sees one. Still, there is a possessive side of Len that makes him want to growl at Rip. “Gideon, plot a course for the Oculus Wellspring. It’s time we seized our destinies back.” 

\--- 

Len is practically wearing a hole in the floor with his pacing when Barry enters the room. 

“Len,” Barry says, and there’s so much hope in Barry’s voice it breaks Len’s heart. “Did you hear that? The Oculus is what has been causing the timeline to stay. If we destroy it your timeline will change. That’s why it didn’t change, that’s why you don’t remember meeting your future self.” 

So Barry doesn’t know that Len is going to die here. The irony is not lost on Len, that Barry is the one who is from the future but yet Len is the only one to know what happens. 

“I heard,” he says, and it’s quiet. He can’t give the game away, because if Barry figures it out Barry will try to prevent it from happening. “You know how we should celebrate?” 

Barry snorts and rolls his eyes. He kisses Len, sweet and unhurried. “You’re going to be different. You’re going to be the person you’ve always wanted to be with nothing to hold you back.” 

Len indulges him. He can’t bear himself to tell Barry the truth. “Will you still like me as a goodie two shoes, Barry? I thought you always liked the bad boys.” 

Barry gives him a playful smirk. “I don’t know. Your past self was absolutely charming. I’d date him.” 

“I was nineteen,” Len makes a face. 

“And I’m twenty-six,” Barry says. “There’s less of an age difference between me and him than you and me.” 

“Touche.” Len snorts. He pulls Barry close to him, kissing him. He’s a master at distraction and Barry falls for it easily. 

Len pauses and pulls back. “If the Time Masters controlled everything that happens to us, is this a part of the plan? Me and you?” 

Barry’s lips are red and swollen and perfect, and his eyes are almost hazy from the kiss. Len feels proud, despite the insecurity bubbling within him. 

Barry shakes his head. “The only things that are determined are your actions as a team, on this ship. They don’t even know I’m here, and my feelings for you started way before you became a legend.” 

Something eases in Len, and he pulls Barry back for more. It’s the right thing to say, because Len is kissing Barry as if he’s the only thing in his life that makes sense. 

Barry gently pulls back, his eyes more serious. “Len...after all of this is over, after the timeline is fixed and we defeat Vandal Savage. I’m going to find you. The new you. I promise.” 

Len can’t begin to tell Barry about the guilt and sadness that is rising up. Instead he pins Barry beneath him on the bed, kissing him senselessly. 

He knows that this will be the last time. 

\-- 

The team walks into a trap. 

Barry takes out the guards within the span of three seconds. 

He’s grinning under his Flash cowl, looking at them. “Sorry. I was feeling left out.” 

There is a small aircraft hovering over them. Finally it lands, and Jax comes out, looking confused. “You stole my line.” Jax says to Barry, but the two grin at each other as old friends just before Jax merges with Stein as Firestorm. 

They go in, facing the Time Masters. 

Len can feel the countdown begin. 

\-- 

Mick is an idiot. Mick is staying to protect the team. To protect him. Len knows that it’s wrong, that Mick is not the one that’s supposed to die. He runs back into to the Oculus for his partner. 

Mick is holding down the failsafe, in place of Raymond. It’s a switch that needs someone to push it down in order for their plan to work. 

Len knows this is where it ends, that this is what he has to do. 

He knocks out Mick with a blow to the head from his gun. He puts his cold gun on top of Mick and takes his place instead, hand on the switch. 

“No!” 

Barry is there behind him, eyes wide. He looks from Mick to Len. 

“This is how it has to be, Barry,” Len says, and even though he knows it to be true, his voice is wavering. “It’s the only way to correct the timeline.” 

“You aren’t supposed to die,” Barry says, and it’s so sad. “I’m supposed to save you. Len. Len let me--I can heal--” 

“If I die, then my timeline will be rewritten,” Len says. “I won’t exist outside of this place, Barry. I’m meant to be here. If you take my place, I’ll still cease to exist when the Oculus is destroyed and you taking my place will be pointless. You and I both know that.” 

Barry knows it’s true. But he’s still got tears in his eyes. “Len--” 

“Take him and go, Barry!” Len says. He can feel it about to go off soon. 

Barry’s crying now, and he goes to Len, kissing him. “I love you,” Barry says. It surprises Len because it’s so soon, but he knows Barry falls hard, fast. He knows in different circumstances that he would have loved Barry too. “And I won’t forget you. I won’t forget this version of you. I promise.” 

Then he’s gone, and so is Mick. 

And then the Oculus explodes, and Len dies. 

_“There are no strings on me.”_

\-- 

_Lenny is nineteen when he meets his older self, and Mick’s. He thinks it’s cool that time travel exists, and then he learns his fate. He and Mick agree to do anything they can to prevent their lives from being ruined._

_He’s given a list of dates and times where their lives have gone to shit, advice on themselves. Lenny wants to ask his future selves how they can still be able to be superheroes and travel through time, but he doesn’t have the guts._

_Their two future selves leave and Lenny feels renewed, hopeful. He eyes the money on the table that his future self had given them. It’s nearly a quarter of a million dollars._

_Lenny has never had anyone to look after him the way that Len has._

_\---_

_Lenny gives Lewis five thousand dollars in exchange of custody over Lisa. If there's one thing Len knows, it's that his father loves money more than he loves his children._

_The case for custody is won at the last second when Lewis takes the bribe, and Lisa practically tackles Len and Mick in happiness. She’s not completely unharmed, but Lenny has managed to save her from a few extra years of punishment._

_\--_

_Lenny is twenty when he gets his GED. It’s perhaps one of his single greatest accomplishments. He finds that without having the stress of his father at home, Lenny can actually enjoy school. Mick takes the GED with him, passing on his first try._

_Lenny starts applying for colleges._

_Mick gets his first job as a bouncer in a nightclub._

_They never go on their first heist, and Lenny never wears a ring on his pinky._

_\--_

_Two years later, Mick lands a position as a public safety officer. His performance at the club has landed him in the good graces of many of the law enforcement and politicians that frequent the nightclub. Mick is a tough kid with a record, but is also a good soul. He also has a love for beating up the bad guys, which is perfect for him._

_Len graduates with an associate’s degree in engineering._

_They’ve barely used the money that Lenny’s future self had given them, able to stay afloat with their jobs._

_\--_

_Len graduates with high marks from university at twenty-five with his bachelor’s degree in engineering and physics. He immediately wants to work on projects that will give kids like himself the opportunities he had gotten from his future self._

_And if he actually wants to figure out how to apply his theories for time travel, that’s just an extra benefit._

_Mick, having shown exemplary service as well as climbing up the ranks, lands his dream job of becoming a firefighter._

_\--_

_The next year, Lisa becomes a fashion designer and entrepreneur when she’s eighteen. She’s sly, assertive and knows almost instinctively how to run a business. She opens a boutique in downtown Central City that is competitive and makes her good money. She’s happy and that’s all that matters. She makes Len and Mick high end tailored suits and Len laughs when Mick scowls in it._

_It’s good and honest, and that’s all that Len cares about._

_\--_

_Len gets his Masters in engineering seven years later. Mick has had several close calls with severe injury or dying, but loves his job as a firefighter. Lisa’s business is booming._

_Lisa opens up a second store out in Starling City, designing outfits for celebrities._

_Len visits her to attend a gala she’s hosting, where he meets his scientist crush Dr. Raymond Palmer. The two talk and Len finds himself drawn to Raymond, as if there is something connecting them, as if they already know each other (or will, in a past life)._

_Len asks Ray out for dinner, and after three amazing dates, the two decide to break up and remain friends. They aren’t right for each other, not compatible as lovers but they are fast friends._

_Dr. Palmer offers to help fund Len’s PhD and gives him a job at his company._

_\---_

_When Len is thirty eight, he gets a job offer from his dream lab in Central City, and there’s something that calls to him in his gut. He knows he needs to go there. He moves back in with Mick._

_He starts his first day at STAR Labs in 2010, working directly under Harrison Wells._

_He meets Cisco Ramon and the two become best friends._

_When he introduces Cisco to Lisa, he knows he’s made one of his best decisions. After eight months of a serious relationship, Lisa and Cisco are engaged and Len feels elated._

_\---_

_In 2014, Lenny has almost forgotten about his conversations with his future self. Not entirely of course, since he wants to learn how to time travel. But he’s forgotten some specifics, until right after the particle accelerator explodes and they bring in someone who has been in a coma._

_He recognizes Barry Allen the moment he sees him, and Len knows he was always meant to be here._

_\--_

_Barry wakes up with incredible powers. Len can’t stop staring even though he knows that he needs to stop. Barry of course is oblivious._

_Len does all that he can to help the speedster learn his abilities. Cisco sees his crush immediately and teases Len mercilessly. Len sometimes hates his brother in law._

_Barry becomes the Blur, because of course the one person who would wake up with powers and use them for good would be Barry Allen._

_Len finds himself falling in love a little more every day._

_\--_

_The cold gun is designed by Cisco, shortly after Barry wakes from his coma, unsure of what Barry will be like when he wakes. Len wants to tell Cisco that Barry is good, that he can be trusted, but has never told anyone besides Mick about the time travel._

_Len picks it up and hears it charge, and it’s such a familiar sound that it’s almost like home._

_Len has a flashback of when he is eight and a man wearing a parka had chased away his bullies with this exact same gun._

_\--_

_Len is the fourth integral part of Team Flash. He, Cisco, Barry and Caitlin spend far too much time in each other’s pockets, and Len sometimes feels too old to be hanging around them. He’s forty-two as opposed to them who are in their late twenties, but at the same time they never exclude him or make him feel unwelcome._

_After Barry seems to have gotten over his crush on Iris, Len feels this is his chance to ask him out._

_Barry, who is faster at everything, asks him out first._

_\--_

_Len insists on it. He’s got the parka, has got the gloves and the goggles to protect him from the stream._

_He’s more familiar with the cold gun than he should be, but that just proves his point even more._

_He’s Barry’s back up. Even though Len has no powers, he’s extremely smart and knows the gun back and forth and has engineered a protective suit underneath the parka, as well as other toys that he and Cisco have collaborated on._

_He calls himself Captain Cold._

_\---_

_Not long after, he designs the Heat Gun, and insists on training Mick with it. Mick has long since been on Team Flash, considering he’s Len’s partner. Mick falls in love with the gun, and joins Len as a superhero with the nickname Heatwave._

_Between the Flash, Heatwave, and Captain Cold, Central City is safer than ever. It's not perfect, but they manage to stop the Reverse Flash. The cold gun is designed to stop speedsters, and Len and Mick distract Thawne while Barry takes his shot at revenge. Len freezes Thawne in place, angry at what he has done to Barry. Barry throws Thawne back into the future, and shortly after the evil speedster is devoured by Time Wraiths._

 _Nobody dies._

_\--_

_Three days later, Iris and Eddie get married. Barry is the best man, and he can't stop smiling proudly as his stepsister becomes Iris West-Thawne._

_\---_

_Two years later, Len and Barry are engaged. Zoom has been defeated after a very long year. Their final showdown nearly killed Len, but Barry is faster. Len has found a way to reverse Zoom's speed, to siphon it off just long enough for the final blow._

_They're dirty and bleeding after the battle and high on adrenaline. Len digs into the pocket of his parka to find the ring he's been holding onto for the right time, and just as his fingers wrap around the small box, Barry is down on one knee in front of him._

_The next day Central City media has the picture of the Flash down on one knee proposing to Captain Cold everywhere._

_Len prints out the picture and frames it in their living room._

_\--_

_One month after, Vandal Savage attacks and they meet a time traveller from the future who recruits Len and Mick._

_Len eagerly agrees, dragging Mick along with him. Barry is not at all happy, but Len tells him that he will be fine and back before he knows it. With a final kiss, Len is off to explore the future and past, just like he’d dreamt of._

_He works with Ray once again, and an amazing team._

_\---_

_When it is time to defeat Vandal Savage, Barry insists on coming with them. He wants to help his fiance beat the Time Masters in any way possible._

_\---_

The Oculus is about to be destroyed. Before Len can protest, he sees the rest of the crew run past him. Mick, Sara, Firestorm and Rip. Rip tells Len that he has Raymond in his pocket, that there is no time. That the Oculus is about to overload and explode. 

Len hurries after, but something feels wrong. He doesn’t know why, but he feels he needs to go back. That he’s missing something. That he needs to be there. The Oculus is calling to him. 

He has an odd feeling in his gut that Mick is in trouble, that Mick has been left behind. 

But then Barry catches Len’s arm, and Len snaps out of his haze. Mick is on the Waverider. Len had just seen him run in. He follows behind Barry, the last one on the ship. He hears the explosion begin miles behind him where the Oculus once was, and a blue light seems to sweep over them, over the ship. Over Len. 

There is an eerie silence as he enters the bridge and once again, it all feels wrong. 

Barry and Sara are huddled together, looking so torn. So hurt. Mick looks like he’s in shock. 

“He traded his life for ours,” Ray says, and he sounds so hurt too. “He was hero. Which I’m sure is the last thing he wanted to be remembered as.” 

“That’s what he was,” Sara says in response, wiping at her eyes. Barry has tears streaming down his eyes, silently. 

“To Leonard,” Raymond says softly, and Len feels a surge of confusion and frustration wash over him. 

“Just because I’m a slow runner doesn’t mean I’m dead, but thanks for the vote of confidence, Raymond,” Len says, rolling his eyes. 

Five pairs of eyes lock onto him. Len feels like a stranger on his own team. 

“Leonard!” Sara’s expression was in disbelief, frowning. “I--but you’re dead.” 

“Obviously not,” he rolls his eyes, because despite thirty years of him being a good human being, he’s still the same snarky asshole deep to the core. 

“How did you survive?” Ray asks, just as Mick pokes Len in the shoulder, as if to prove he’s real. “Anyone pressing down that switch would have died.” 

Len frowns in confusion. “What the hell are you talking about, Raymond? What switch?” 

“You’re not our Len.” 

Barry’s voice is shocked, but firm. His eyes dry and red from crying. He stands up, looking at Len. Looking at his hands. There’s only one ring on Len’s finger, and it’s the one Barry had put on there long ago. “You’re--it worked.” 

“What are you talking about, Red?” Mick scowls. He still hasn’t stopped touching Len, poking and prodding at him. Mick looks more gruff than his normal self. More reckless. But then Mick blinks and there’s something that seems to cross the pyro’s features. He looks at Len, almost in realization. Recognition. “I remember being a firefighter.” 

“The Oculus was preventing your timelines from being rewritten,” Barry says, looking at Len. “Len had gone back to directly intervene with his past, but he couldn’t change anything. When Len--when our Len died and the Oculus was destroyed, the new timeline took effect. This is--the new Len from the new timeline.” 

“Wouldn’t that just create a paradox?” Ray asks, too in shock to really think it all through and Len looks over at him. 

“The Vanishing Point is outside of time,” Len explains, slowly understanding. He turns to Sara, Mick and the rest of the team. “Meaning, in layman’s terms any timelines that converge to the Vanishing Point will intersect here. We are able to coexist here without a paradox. The other--the other me dying is now a fixed point since the event destroyed the Oculus itself.” 

An odd look is thrown his way by Mick. “He’s smarter than the real Snart.” 

Len glares. “I am the real Snart. Just a different one. And I have a PhD in Engineering and the entire Doctor Who series on DVD.” 

“So why do I still remember everything from before?” Mick scowls. “Except getting to be a firefighter.” 

“I think perhaps, your memories--as well as ours--will gradually become rewritten or we may not be affected while inside the Waverider,” Stein ventures. “Assuming you’ve been closest to Mr. Snart, your memories might return faster since you were more--involved in his lifetime.” 

Barry takes a step to Len, looking at him. Len gives him a smile, glad that Barry is here with him. 

“Do you...recognize me, Len?” Barry asks softly. “Do we know each other in your lifetime?” 

Len smiles. He proudly holds up his left hand to show off his engagement ring. His voice is soft, because despite Barry not recognizing him as he is, Len knows Barry is the same person deep down. The same Barry that visited him all those years ago. “You visited me when I was a kid to help me. And now--we’re engaged.” 

Barry gives him a soft and sappy smile, kissing Len chastely, almost shyly. Barry gasps and pulls back. “I think I just had a memory. We proposed to each other at the same time, right after Zoom.” 

“We did.” Len can’t help but feel the blossom of hope in his chest. 

“I think--” Barry reaches out for him. “I think I’m gonna look forward to remembering everything.” 

He knows it’s not perfect, that there is still a long ways to go. There are still a lot of memories to remember, and Len will never fault Barry for still loving another version of him. That version of Len, who had thought he was an awful man, but was secretly Len’s own hero. The thief and crook who had sacrificed his own life to give himself another chance, to give Len a better life. He’s glad that Barry will be able to remember that man, to honor that memory of him, and still be able to love Len as he is now. 

Len may be a superhero now, but that version of Leonard Snart was truly a legend.


End file.
